Who's who · Embodied AI & robotics
Boston Dynamics
Robotics company behind the Spot, Stretch and Atlas robots, owned by Hyundai
At a glance
- Founded
- 1992
- Based in
- Waltham, Massachusetts, United States
- People
- Amanda McMaster, Interim chief executive and chief financial officer; Marc Raibert, Founder
- Known for
- Atlas, Spot, Stretch
- Funding
- Private; owned by Hyundai Motor Group
- Owner
- Hyundai Motor Group (since 2021)
- Website
- https://bostondynamics.com
Boston Dynamics builds mobile robots for industry. Marc Raibert founded it in 1992 as a spin-off from MIT. It was bought by Google in 2013, sold to SoftBank in 2017 and acquired by Hyundai, its current owner, in 2021. It is based in Waltham, Massachusetts.
Its products are Spot, a four-legged robot used for industrial inspection and safety work, Stretch, which unloads trucks and handles boxes in warehouses, and Atlas, an electric humanoid. Boston Dynamics unveiled the product version of Atlas at CES in January 2026 and began manufacturing it straight away, with 2026 deployments at Hyundai and Google DeepMind. It is working with Google DeepMind to bring that lab's AI foundation models, large general-purpose models, into Atlas, starting with car manufacturing tasks. Hyundai plans a robot factory able to make 30,000 robots a year.
Robert Playter, chief executive since 2020, stepped down in February 2026. Amanda McMaster, the chief financial officer, has been interim chief executive since then while the company looks for a permanent replacement. In June 2026 Boston Dynamics announced plans to invest $100 million in a new facility in Waltham for manufacturing, AI and research.
Sources
- Boston Dynamics, Boston Dynamics Unveils New Atlas Robot to Revolutionize Industry, 2026-01-05
- Boston Dynamics, Boston Dynamics Expands Massachusetts Footprint with New 323,000 Square Foot Facility in Waltham, 2026-06-24
- TechCrunch, Boston Dynamics CEO Robert Playter steps down after 30 years at the company, 2026-02-10
- Fortune, Boston Dynamics CEO: America's next 250 years will be built by robots, 2026-06-30
Facts last checked 2026-10-02