When Will Robots Live With Us? Inside 1X's NEO with Dar Sleeper

Description

Would you live with a humanoid robot? Could you beat one in a fight? Today, we're talking to Dar Sleeper, VP of Design, Product, and Marketing at 1x, the company building Neo, a humanoid robot designed to live and work alongside humans in the home. We discuss why the home is actually the most strategic beachhead in humanoid robotics, how world models are collapsing the gap between robots that follow instructions and robots that genuinely learn, why consumer adoption may be the unlock that industrial deployments can never be, and what it feels like to have a 60-pound robot in your house long before the rest of the world can get one. All of this right here, right now, on the Modern CTO Podcast! 00:00 – Introduction and the 1x Sanctuary 02:00 – Building Neo's World Model Shoot 04:23 – Can Neo Do Your Laundry? 07:30 – Shared Autonomy and the Waymo Parallel 08:43 – Who Has Neo at Home Today 10:16 – When Does 1x Start Shipping? 11:37 – Why Shipping a Great Product Matters for the Industry 13:11 – The Most Impatient Customer Segment 16:26 – Dar's Experience Living With Neo 17:22 – How the AI and Manual Control Interact 18:02 – Teaching Neo New Skills 19:26 – How World Models Changed Everything 22:17 – Can You Physically Overpower Neo? 23:14 – Tendon Drives vs. Traditional Actuators 26:20 – Why the Home First, Not the Factory 28:18 – Lessons from 1x's Prior Robot, Eve 31:10 – Safety, Data Diversity, and Consumer Adoption 33:14 – How World Models Mirror Human Thought 37:39 – The US vs. China in the Humanoid Race 43:54 – Government Support and the Energy Economy 47:32 – Where to Find 1x and Sign Up #robot #future #1x