[Jeon Hwa-seong's Startup Morning Coffee No. 1039] Opening the Future with Robots: The Robotics

Every day at 8:40 AM, 'Startup Morning Coffee,' broadcast live on the 'Jeon Hwa-sung's CNTV' channel, is a prominent YouTube program hosted by CEO Jeon Hwa-sung that vitalizes the startup ecosystem. This program not only deeply introduces the core competencies and market potential of various startups but also effectively serves as a useful information platform through interactive communication with viewers via real-time comments. In a recent broadcast, 'The Robotics,' which is developing Korea's first follow-type autonomous agricultural robot, gained attention. Although smart farm robot technology is growing rapidly, the environments of facility smart farms and open-field smart farms are completely different, requiring a new approach for open-field agriculture automation. Considering the characteristics of open-field environments, which are difficult to address with existing camera, LiDAR, and GPS-based autonomous driving methods, The Robotics provides an innovative solution with 'BotBox,' a UWB (Ultra-Wideband) wireless communication-based follow-type transport robot. The core of The Robotics is precisely this 'BotBox.' 'BotBox' is a smart robot that uses UWB technology to follow workers like a shadow and transport harvested crops. It possesses an amazing function: once a certain weight is reached, it autonomously moves to a central cultivator, unloads the cargo, and then returns to the worker. Furthermore, it stably performs tasks by avoiding small obstacles in furrows through a sophisticated obstacle avoidance driving algorithm. Currently, The Robotics is further advancing its technology through CNT Tech's Nongjinwon Juice (Korea Agency of Education, Promotion & Information Service in Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries - primary purpose: startup investment linkage) program. CEO Jeon Hwa-sung highly praised The Robotics' potential, stating, "It has already successfully proceeded with overseas exports to countries such as Japan and Uzbekistan, and since last August, it has been applied to 97 domestic farms, revolutionarily increasing efficiency in agricultural fields." Great anticipation is placed on the changes 'BotBox' will bring to rural areas suffering from labor shortages and an aging population, as well as the company's continuous growth in the future.