How Spot and Updated Orbit Are Transforming Industrial Inspections
Asset reliability has always been the heartbeat of efficient industrial operations, but there’s more to facility health than the sum of its machines. Corrosion, clutter, safety risks, missing signage, and flickering indicator lights often escape digital attention. These small, seemingly peripheral issues can stack up fast, impacting safety, compliance, and ultimately, productivity.
For many plant managers, the current system of inspections is far from ideal. Observations often exist in scattered notes, spreadsheets, or worse—in someone’s memory. When problems arise, the lack of historical context leads to reactive decision-making and endless firefighting. That’s where Boston Dynamics‘ Spot robot and its brainy sidekick, the Orbit platform, step in.
Say Hello to Autonomous AI Inspections
Spot isn’t just a robotic dog with a camera strapped to its back. It’s an AI-powered inspector that roams your site, eyes wide open, logging and storing valuable visual data. With the latest updates to Orbit—Boston Dynamics’ intelligent automation platform—Spot is smarter than ever.
The new release brings cutting-edge vision-language AI prompts into play, allowing Spot to identify and interpret safety hazards, equipment conditions, or maintenance needs in real-time.
“Now, Spot can walk the floor and tell you if a fire extinguisher is missing, a pallet is out of place, or a valve looks worn”, said a Boston Dynamics spokesperson. “It’s about bringing human-level understanding to autonomous inspections.”
Spot autonomously takes photos at designated points of interest, which Orbit then analyses using its AI toolkit. Whether it’s binary data (yes/no), numeric values, percentages, or descriptive observations, the system turns images into actionable insights.
Building a Living Visual History
Creating a comprehensive digital twin can be an expensive and time-intensive endeavour. For many operators, what’s needed is a flexible, lightweight visual log—enter Site View.
This new Orbit feature offers a panoramic view of your facility over time using 360° images captured by Spot. With Site View, users can:
- Remotely monitor and review historical facility conditions
- Generate new inspection routines directly from stored imagery
- Track visual changes and detect slow-building issues
All this, without even setting foot on-site. It’s facility management reimagined: low-friction, always-on, and incredibly scalable.
Enterprise-Ready, Privacy-First
Industrial operations demand security and scalability, and Orbit delivers on both fronts. The latest update introduces built-in face blurring to protect privacy, automatically blacking out faces captured via Spot Cam+IR. Whether you’re operating in a tightly regulated environment or just respecting employee privacy, this tool helps maintain compliance without the admin overhead.
“With automated face blurring, companies can focus on data, not red tape”, explained the Orbit product team. “It’s another way we’re streamlining adoption at scale.”
Orbit also now supports flexible user permissions. Admins can set granular access controls based on roles, ensuring data integrity and operational security without bottlenecks.
Managing Fleets Across Sites
One of Orbit’s standout upgrades is its enterprise-level fleet management. From a central dashboard, users can now:
- Monitor robot activity across multiple locations
- View aggregated site performance data
- Oversee fleet health in real time
This single-pane-of-glass approach means operational teams no longer need to juggle dashboards, spreadsheets, or separate logins. It’s a unified command centre for smarter, faster decision-making.
And when it’s time to update? Orbit allows over-the-air software updates, bundling firmware for Spot and its payloads in one go. Tailor different configurations for various robots, then deploy them en masse—efficient, hands-free, and consistent.
Control On Your Terms
Prefer to keep your data on-premise? Orbit can now run as a virtual machine, giving companies full control over where and how their data is processed. For many in the industrial sector, this flexibility is non-negotiable.
Whether you’re looking for a cloud-based setup or something rooted firmly in your own servers, Orbit adapts to your infrastructure without skipping a beat.
Smarter Thermal Monitoring with AI Thresholds
Thermal inspections are a staple in predictive maintenance, but defining temperature thresholds often requires deep expertise. Orbit tackles this with Auto Thermal Thresholds—a new feature that sets intelligent min/max values by statistically analysing multiple sample points.
This means operators can:
- Detect overheating components faster
- Set dynamic inspection rules
- Rely less on manual calibration
Fewer false alarms. Quicker responses. Smarter operations.
Connecting with Your Ecosystem
Integrating with third-party systems can often feel like pulling teeth. Orbit now introduces a beta feature: codeless work order integration. This low-code solution allows for seamless syncing with existing systems using APIs and webhooks, without the usual developer overhead.
From automated ticket creation to syncing inspection logs, it’s another cog in the machine making workflows smoother.
A Clearer Picture of Operational Health
Spot and Orbit together offer more than automation. They represent a paradigm shift in how industrial sites are monitored, maintained, and optimised. Visual inspections, once reliant on memory and manual note-taking, are now intelligent, repeatable, and instantly actionable.
For plant managers, safety officers, and operations leads, the message is clear: “With Spot and Orbit, you’re no longer working in the dark.”
Smarter Plants, Safer Operations
As industries across the board look to digitalise and decarbonise, tools like Spot and Orbit aren’t just nice to have—they’re essential. AI-led inspections bring clarity, consistency, and confidence to operations. They help prevent downtime, ensure compliance, and create safer working environments.
From AI-driven patrols to dynamic thermal analytics and fleet-wide oversight, Boston Dynamics is paving the way for the intelligent factory of the future. And with features built for scale, privacy, and integration, it’s a journey that any facility—regardless of size—can embark on today.
