One of the top humanoid robot firms, California-based Figure AI, has been sued by its former head of product safety. Robert Gruendel claims he was wrongfully terminated after warning top executives that the company’s machines were capable of causing severe physical harm. The complaint, filed in California, alleges that Figure fired the engineer, days after he delivered what he described as his “most direct and documented safety complaints.”
According to the lawsuit, Gruendel warned CEO Brett Adcock and chief engineer Kyle Edelberg that the company’s robots were “powerful enough to fracture a human skull,” citing an incident in which one of the robots allegedly “carved a -inch gash into a steel refrigerator door during a malfunction.” The legal filing says his concerns were dismissed and “treated as obstacles, not obligations,” before he was told he was being let go for a “vague ‘change in business direction.”
In a CNBC report, a Figure spokesperson disputed those claims by email, saying Gruendel was “terminated for poor performance” and that his “allegations are falsehoods that Figure will thoroughly discredit in court.”
Gruendel is seeking economic, compensatory, and punitive damages, as well as a jury trial. His attorney, Robert Ottinger, told CNBC that “California law protects employees who report unsafe practices,” adding that the case may be “among the first whistleblower cases related to the safety of humanoid robots.” He said his client hopes the judicial process...
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