Spencer Deng's guest appearances

Spencer Deng

China Money Podcast - Audio Episodes

Elon Musk

Jim Rogers

Andreessen Horowitz

Lisa Randall

Didi Chuxing

Marc Faber

Jonathan Larsen

Hao Jingfang

Canaan IPO

Fritz Demopoulos

Stuart Leckie

Grant Horsfield

Gary Rieschel

James Huang

Jie Gong

OwlTail

Spencer Deng, founder of Shenzhen-based robotics and AI start-up Dorabot Inc., wants to build a Silicon Valley startup with Shenzhen speed to fully automate the whole logistics process. Ever since being put into an internship as a teenage delivery boy at EMS, the 30-year-old entrepreneur has been thinking about how to solve this complicated puzzle making machines do all the boring and repetitive logistics work. Now, leading a team camped out in a remote warehouse in Shenzhen, Deng works with dozens of robotics geeks from around the world trying to solve specific puzzle pieces. In one corner, a Yaskawa robotic arm is being "trained" to read parcel labels on a conveyor belt, pick up the parcels and drop them into different sorting containers.With an aim to achieve cost savings and better efficiency in the task of sorting, Dorabot bought the Yaskawa robotic arm. It then placed cameras on the it, added self-made graspers, and built back-end systems to enable the arm to read labels via image recognition, quickly figure out how best to pick up the item based on its shape and material, and put it in the correct containers."One of the big reasons why the (robotics/AI) industry is growing so rapidly is that deep learning made huge breakthrough around 2010, leading to significant improvements in computer vision, facial recognition...This suddenly opened up a lot more applications (in other sectors)," Deng told China Money Network in an interview at Dorabot's Shenzhen headquarters. "If we capture enough data from the logistics industry (using image recognition), we might be able to improve optimization significantly."The optimization part is best explained in an example. Dorabot is helping a global furniture company optimize pellet placement in their containers for shipping. It takes a lot of training for very skilled workers to know how to place the pellets to save space and material. But with cloud-based systems, AI algorithms and deep learning capabilities, the best placement solution takes a second to be generated, and the workers just need to execute it.For now, most of Dorabot's products are in the research and development stage with a few being implemented in real-world use cases. But Deng's timing to start an AI company in logistics is impeccable.Chinese e-commerce giants Alibaba and JD.com, as well as major express delivery firms, have all been pushing aggressively in smart logistics. During this year's 11.11 shopping festival, ALOG Technology, a key supplier of warehouse management services for Alibaba's Tmall Supermarket, worked with Chinese AI unicorn Megvii Technology and Ares Robot to help handle the massive 1.35 billion orders placed during a one-day event. A total of 500 fulfillment robots worked for five days non-stop (except for battery recharge) to fulfill 1.5 million goods, says Megvii in a Wechat post. Megvii acquired Ares Robot, a logistics robotics firm, earlier this year for an undisclosed amount.In Deng's vision, however, making the logistics process partially automated is far from enough. Kiva Systems, now known as Amazon Robotics after it was acquired by the American e-commerce giant in 2012, is a symbolic solution most commonly seen in today's warehouses around the world. Alibaba's Cainiao warehouses use lots of similar fulfillment robots - mostly made by Chinese copycats of Kiva Systems - to move goods around in warehouses, so workers don't have to walk around to pick up or put back certain products."The difference between automation and robotics/AI is that there is no "thinking" or "learning" in automation," says Deng in the interview. "Automation is perhaps a lower level system that companies use before moving to more intelligent robotics/AI solutions."In a way, what Deng envisions is a more "fancy" system that can further squeeze efficiency improvements from existing systems that have already cut significant numbers of human laborers.

Spencer Deng, founder of Shenzhen-based robotics and AI start-up Dorabot Inc., wants to build a Silicon Valley startup with Shenzhen speed to fully automate the whole logistics process. Ever since being put into an internship as a teenage delivery boy at EMS, the 30-year-old entrepreneur has been thinking about how to solve this complicated puzzle making machines do all the boring and repetitive logistics work. Now, leading a team camped out in a remote warehouse in Shenzhen, Deng works with dozens of robotics geeks from around the world trying to solve specific puzzle pieces. In one corner, a Yaskawa robotic arm is being "trained" to read parcel labels on a conveyor belt, pick up the parcels and drop them into different sorting containers. With an aim to achieve cost savings and better efficiency in the task of sorting, Dorabot bought the Yaskawa robotic arm. It then placed cameras on the it, added self-made graspers, and built back-end systems to enable the arm to read labels via image recognition, quickly figure out how best to pick up the item based on its shape and material, and put it in the correct containers. "One of the big reasons why the (robotics/AI) industry is growing so rapidly is that deep learning made huge breakthrough around 2010, leading to significant improvements in computer vision, facial recognition...This suddenly opened up a lot more applications (in other sectors)," Deng told China Money Network in an interview at Dorabot's Shenzhen headquarters. "If we capture enough data from the logistics industry (using image recognition), we might be able to improve optimization significantly." The optimization part is best explained in an example. Dorabot is helping a global furniture company optimize pellet placement in their containers for shipping. It takes a lot of training for very skilled workers to know how to place the pellets to save space and material. But with cloud-based systems, AI algorithms and deep learning capabilities, the best placement solution takes a second to be generated, and the workers just need to execute it. For now, most of Dorabot's products are in the research and development stage with a few being implemented in real-world use cases. But Deng's timing to start an AI company in logistics is impeccable. Chinese e-commerce giants Alibaba and <a href="http://JD.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">JD.com</a>, as well as major express delivery firms, have all been pushing aggressively in smart logistics. During this year's 11.11 shopping festival, ALOG Technology, a key supplier of warehouse management services for Alibaba's Tmall Supermarket, worked with Chinese AI unicorn Megvii Technology and Ares Robot to help handle the massive 1.35 billion orders placed during a one-day event. A total of 500 fulfillment robots worked for five days non-stop (except for battery recharge) to fulfill 1.5 million goods, says Megvii in a Wechat post. Megvii acquired Ares Robot, a logistics robotics firm, earlier this year for an undisclosed amount. In Deng's vision, however, making the logistics process partially automated is far from enough. Kiva Systems, now known as Amazon Robotics after it was acquired by the American e-commerce giant in 2012, is a symbolic solution most commonly seen in today's warehouses around the world. Alibaba's Cainiao warehouses use lots of similar fulfillment robots - mostly made by Chinese copycats of Kiva Systems - to move goods around in warehouses, so workers don't have to walk around to pick up or put back certain products. "The difference between automation and robotics/AI is that there is no "thinking" or "learning" in automation," says Deng in the interview. "Automation is perhaps a lower level system that companies use before moving to more intelligent robotics/AI solutions." In a way, what Deng envisions is a more "fancy" system that can further squeeze efficiency improvements from existing systems that have already cut significant numbers of human laborers.

Dorabot’s Spencer Deng Is Building A Silicon Valley Startup With Shenzhen Speed To Enable Smart Logistics