(PNS reporting from GUANAJUATO, MX) State-of-the-art leaf blower technology developed in Mexico’s Silicon Barrio is at the heart the Pentagon’s latest robot warrior, PNS has learned.
The PopoPotencia leaf blower engine powers the WildCat, a Boston Dynamics combat robot (video) built for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
(BREAKING: Google, Inc. has completed the acquisition of Boston Dynamics.)
The distinctive whining sound of the PopoPotencia leaf blower engine — the “Harley-Davidson rumble of the two-stroke world” — was “ruggedized and maximated” for use in the Wildcat running robot, according to Boston Dynamics.
“We wanted WildCat to make enemy combatants flee the minute she was powered up,” Senior Robot Runner Stross von Doctorow told PNS. “And PopoPotencia’s leaf blower engine technology met and exceeded our expectations.”
PopoPotencia is the first shipping product from Popo y Asociados, one of the startup companies lured to Guanajuato by Gov. Alejandro Ramirez Sanchez de Bernstein, as he works to broaden the region’s economy. Until recently, the area was dependent on the sale of Guanajuato’s primary exports, guano and juato.
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