Tencent Robotics X, a robotics research company in Shenzhen-China has unveiled its new robot named Ollie. The wheel-legged mini-bot moves around planes, bumps, climb downstairs, avoid obstacles, and even does a backflip. Push it or pull it, Ollie is in perfect balance!
The first glimpse of Ollie reminds us of Boston Dynamics‘ agility robots designed to transverse uneven terrains. However, Ollie has a multifunctional tail that swings front and back to gain balance, especially when it does the backflip in a wink of an eye. Also, the actuated tail allows Ollie to gain some extra height and supports a robotic arm attachment to get you a coffee.
A short video of Ollie shows some impressive stunts of the mini-bot:
Thank you BotJunkie for sharing the video!
Tencent has presented Ollie as a part of its paper related to “non-linear balancing control of robots,” which was submitted by a group of Tencent scientists at the International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2021. With the height adjustments, attached arm, and sensors, Ollie looks like a little office assistant that can help us deliver things across the premises.
But I am still wondering why would the office assistant do a backflip except to entertain us. Any ideas? Just pour your thoughts in the comments box.
