20 percent lighter: NEURA shows 4NE1 Gen 4 humanoid at new Munich RoboGym

NEURA Robotics and the Technical University of Munich (TUM) opened the TUM RoboGym on 22 October, a robot training and research centre of more than 2,300 square metres on the LabCampus at Munich Airport. To mark the launch, NEURA unveiled the fourth generation of its humanoid robot: according to the company, 4NE1 Gen 4 is about 20 percent lighter than its predecessor, has improved hands for more precise grips and so-called “Smart Limbs” with reflexes, allowing each limb to react on its own. The company did not give an actual weight; the robot is being prepared for series production.

4NE1 is controlled by NEURA's own AI model Neuron AI, which processes vision, touch, force, sound and the robot's internal state – the video introduces the model. Since September, companies from more than ten industries, including automotive, pharma, medical technology, logistics, agriculture and care, have been practising tasks at the RoboGym such as handling cardboard boxes, filling bottles and loading and unloading wooden parts. Training data comes from real robot runs, human demonstrations using sensor suits, motion capture and teleoperation, and simulation.

The partners are initially investing about 17 million euros over three years, around 11 million of it from NEURA. TUM President Thomas Hofmann said: “The TUM RoboGym robotics center is unique in Germany and Europe.” More NEURA training centres are planned in Europe, the US and China, and another German one is being built with RWTH Aachen. NEURA also showed the new humanoid at Nvidia's GTC developer conference in Berlin.