Both are crowdfunding right now -- Magni has only 1 week days to go and Misty has just launched today. Both robots come from pedigree robotics companies and both robots are top of the line in terms of capabilities. And I have to confess, I'm a sucker for great robot crowdfunding campaigns so have purchased one of each for Silicon Valley Robotics and Circuit Launch. Magni is a robust mobile platform capable of carrying a payload of over 100 kilos, developed by Ubiquity Robotics. It comes with all the sensors you need for autonomous navigation, indoor or outdoor, has a sophisticated power train, and runs on a Raspberry Pi and ROS.

There are any number of robotics development platforms out there, and we've written about most of them--TurtleBots, iRobot Creates, and more recently robots like Misty. Generally, these platforms are intended to be used for experimenting with sensors and software, or for more socially-oriented applications that don't involve much in the way of lifting or moving stuff. A Silicon Valley startup called Ubiquity Robotics believes that there's an opportunity here, and they're crowdfunding a robot called Magni that's specifically designed to handle large payloads for long durations. It comes with sensing and computing out of the box, and Ubiquity hopes it'll enable hobbyists to create a new generation of practical robotic solutions. Here's what you get with Magni: In addition, Ubiquity is offering Loki, a small and more or less affordable learning platform that you can use to develop applications for Magni.