Brazilian data center operator Scala is testing a robot dog for fire safety inspections.
“We’re proud to introduce Scaley, Scala's robotic dog and object of research by our Center of Excellence in Engineering,” the company said on LinkedIn this week. “Scaley has already successfully completed test runs in which it reads pressure gauges on fire extinguishers through Artificial Intelligence.”
While Scala doesn’t name the model or provider, the robot looks likely to be a Go1 from Chinese provider Unitree.
Standing around 30cm tall and half a meter long, the Go1 is small than some other robot dogs. It offers a number of onboard camera and sensor options alongside a 16-core onboard CPU + GPU unit capable of 1.5 teraflops of processing. In an image shared by Scala, ‘Scaley’ appears to be equipped with a LiDAR sensor.
Formed in 2020 by DigitalBridge out of data center assets it acquired from Brazilian IT firm UOL Diveo, Scala currently operates three data centers in Tamboré (with two more planned), one in Campinas, and one in the center of São Paulo. A new data center campus in Rio is in development as is a two-building campus in Porto Alegre. Three data centers are planned in Chile, and the company is also planning to expand into Mexico and Colombia.
Scala is far from the only operator exploring the use of quadruped robots for data center operations. Earlier this month Swiss robotics firm Anybotics said Digital Realty had been using one of its Anymal machines to conduct regular inspection tours of a facility in Switzerland since the summer of 2022.
Utah-based Novva has deployed Boston Dynamics Spot robots at its flagship campus and said it plans to roll out more in the future. The company has also deployed drones for security purposes and is exploring having microdrones roam data halls for inspection purposes.
Mexican operator Kio has also previously deployed two Spot machines for data center operations, while GlobalFoundries deployed Spot at a chip fab plant in Vermont for monitoring purposes.
Oracle is currently conducting a data center trial utilizing Spot at its Oracle Labs facility in Chicago, Illinois.
As well as Anybotics, Boston Dynamics, and Unitree, quadruped robot developers include Xiaomi and Weilan in China as well as Ghost Robotics in the US.