On Monday, 5th October (a very wet night indeed), over 100 people got together in Bristol to hear Mike Aldred, from Dyson, talk about the challenges in bringing a consumer grade robot to market.



It was a fascinating insight into the project  and brought home the need for companies to have clear objectives, a robust test plan, (quote from Mike: "Test, test and test"!),  and the ability to adapt in the face of challenges and failures.The Dyson 360 Eye robot vacuum cleaner has been in the making for 10 years and Mike showed a really interesting timeline which included, as a comparison, developments in mobile phones.



For the Dyson 360 Eye to be ready, it had to satisfy a function first (in this case, it had to be a great vacuum cleaner); from the average user’s point of view, the robotics aspect of it is secondary. To be compelling, it had to do the job better than a human would. 



Mike highlighted some of the high and lows of the project, the challenges of bridging academia and business, and how to use a diverse team to take an idea from the lab into real homes - incuding some footage shot in Mike's real home!



Excellent feedback was received after the event, including:



Extremely interesting talk, giving an insight into the way Dyson develop its products and the support James Dyson provides his employees



Mike is a very good speaker, and is clearly passionate about his work



This event was fascinating to see how the Dyson company does business in a different way, putting the customer first. While the robot vac has a way to go before it becomes mainstream the engineering involved is very impressive and goes with techniques that work not gimmicks



If you missd the event, don't worry we filmed it and you can view on IET.tv