NEWS

FORMER SCHAFT FOUNDER & CEO DR. YUTO NAKANISHI PARTICIPATES IN GITAI, THE SPACE ROBOT STARTUP

Dr. Yuto Nakanishi, former SCHAFT (bipedal robot venture, acquired by Google in 2013) founder and CEO, has joined GITAI, a developer of robots to replace astronauts in space operations (headquarters: San Francisco, US; Japanese branch: Meguro Ward, Tokyo), as COO.

■Yuto Nakanishi, Ph.D.

Ex-Founder&CEO of SCHAFT. After retiring from the research associate of the University of Tokyo Graduate School of Information and Technology, he established SCHAFT; the startup of bipedal robot. He sold it to Google in 2013.

■Dr. Yuto Nakanishi’s Comment

“I have devoted my entire life to robots. Over these past eight years, I have helped establish SCHAFT to make bipedal robots a reality, a childhood dream of mine, came in first at the DARPA Robotics Challenge, and have continued to work toward the practical application of bipedal robots after being acquired by Google. SCHAFT was dissolved by Google at the end of 2018, but I have no regrets at present, because we at SCHAFT worked on bipedal robotics at the highest level in the world, and did everything possible at the time. I have one more childhood dream. And that is to create the first robot that works in space. I have had several opportunities to encounter a number of enterprises since the dissolution of SCHAFT, and am confident that GITAI is the team that will help realize this dream, which is why I have decided to join their efforts. We will definitely create the world’s greatest robot, that will work in space. Look forward to it.”