It would seem like such an obvious win-win if these cleaning robotics companies just won a couple of contracts with some tech forward hotel chains.

  - Faster R&D since hotel rooms are regular/familiar
  - Cost center for hotels so revenue would be higher/straightforward
  - No privacy issues since robots would not be present in rooms with guests
  - Easier servicing/maintenance since multiple robots at same location

▲ tikhonj 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

My guess is that they're currently nowhere near robust or effective enough to make that realistic. They need to bootstrap somehow, if only get good enough to convince hotel management that their approach will be realistic in the future.

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ASalazarMX 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

This is my take too. Hotels wouldn't be happy if a robot knocked a water jar on the carpet, or scratched a wall, but a home owner? We're doing it for free and you asked for it!

Hotel's girl management might be more undertanding than I assume, though.

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thalesac an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

in that case they could operate the robots remotely just like self driving cars sometimes

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ForHackernews 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

>girl management

autocorrect glitch?

	▲	tikhonj 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Haha, yes, meant to write "hotel management". I'll update the answer to fix that.

▲ throwaway85825 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Basically every AI startup promises the world instead of descoping to something that is achievable and profitable. Easier to scam investors than make a working product.

▲ fmbb 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I’m not sure it can ever be cheaper than a human cleaner so maybe the hotel industry does not want to subsidize the training.

▲ woah an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

These guys may actually just be angling to sell off the training data. diverse training data is more valuable