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If you think <keyword id="10387" type="CITY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Microsoft">Microsoft</keyword>’s prolonged search for the next <keyword id="5645" type="POSITION" weightage="100" keywordseo="CEO">CEO</keyword> is getting a bit nutty, especially with a disgruntled <keyword id="62333" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Steve-Ballmer">Steve Ballmer</keyword> waiting on the sidelines to hand over the mantle, you are not far from the truth. But then, that is the actual state of the coveted C-Suite nowadays – volatile is the right word if you want to sum it up. There is no job security at the top and even the best performer for years can get redundant within the span of a few weeks. The issues could be many – right from <keyword id="646347" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="poor-performance">poor performance</keyword> to <keyword id="610960" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="business-restructuring">business restructuring</keyword> to alleged <keyword id="6375736" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="corruption-charges">corruption charges</keyword>. But the biggest factor is relevance, a perfect future-fit that can take companies ahead, according to <keyword id="67736" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Industry-experts">industry experts</keyword>. In a difficult <keyword id="34412" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="economy">economy</keyword>, companies are compelled to twist and turn to keep track of profitability and their requirements change accordingly. Hence, their leaders have to adapt, shape up or ship out, as the case might be. 
 India is no exception and business leaders across the country have been frequently ‘released’ by industry giants. Many of them leave with ‘immediate effect’ while others are on garden leave or worse still, waiting for their predecessors to turn up (just like Ballmer). Yet, most of the C-Suite executives are tight-lipped about their departures, at least here in India. We are yet to come across an announcement like the one made by <keyword id="384914" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Groupon">Groupon</keyword>’s founder and former CEO <keyword id="488139" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Andrew-Mason">Andrew Mason</keyword>. But exit happens all the same – be it discreet or blatant. Here’s a quick look at some of the top-notch C-Suite executives from India who parted ways with their respective companies in 2013, their official exit lines and what happened behind the scene.

Strife At The Top: These
11 C-Suite Execs From India
Were ‘Let Go’ In 2013

Amidst an increasing number of unscrupulous persons or entities trying to provide unrealistic investment tips, <keyword id="19905454" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="stock-exchanges" source="keywords">stock exchanges</keyword> in India have come together with an advisory to sensitize <keyword id="19900618" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="investors" source="keywords">investors</keyword> about its consequences. In a joint advisory on Monday, leading stock exchanges, <keyword id="19895774" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="BSE" source="keywords" meta.keywordsubtype="org" meta.entityname="BSE" meta.hostid="261" meta.entityid="BSE">BSE</keyword>, NSE, NCDEX, MCX, and MSE advised investors to exercise due caution and refrain from joining any <keyword id="19897919" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="social-media" source="keywords">social media</keyword> groups where stock recommendations are given along with market analysis or downloading any App offering investment opportunities. Joining such groups or downloading such fake apps could make investors victims of "transnational <keyword id="20490528" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="financial-fraud" source="keywords">financial fraud</keyword> promising unrealistic returns," the joint advisory said. "It has been brought to the notice of the Exchanges that some unscrupulous persons or entities operating through Indian and international mobile numbers, through social media platforms, are falsely claiming to offer trading opportunities through <keyword id="21574670" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="foreign-portfolio-investment" source="keywords">Foreign Portfolio Investment</keyword> (FPI) or <keyword id="22923323" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="foreign-institutional-investor" source="keywords">Foreign Institutional Investor</keyword> (FII), impersonating reputed financial institutions", the advisory said. The joint advisory accused those entities of showcasing fake certificates purportedly issued by SEBI/ Exchanges. "These operations often use mobile numbers registered under false names to orchestrate their schemes," the joint advisory read. The activities of such unscrupulous entities include claims of being associated with organizations/individuals of repute, promising guaranteed or high returns without the need for a demat account, offering to handle trading accounts by asking investors to share their login credentials, facilitating pre-IPO subscriptions with false promises of assured profits, among many others. Hence, the exchanges came together and cautioned investors to be skeptical of any social media claim of high returns from trading in the securities market through fictitious institutional accounts and not fall for stock market advice/analysis. Victims can report such suspected <keyword id="19898489" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="fraud" source="keywords">fraud</keyword> communications at the Chakshu facility on www.sancharsaathi.gov.in and in case one has already lost money, they can report the same on cybercrime helpline number 1930 or www.cybercrime.gov.in. Investors are also advised to refer to webpage links of stock exchanges to verify the genuine trading App, websites, and bank accounts of recognized stockbrokers. Investors must understand that investments offering high returns usually involve high risk, including fraud risk, and there can be no guarantees of assured returns in the securities market.

NSE, BSE advise investors against dealing with entities assuring unreal returns

Chennai, Mar 26 (): Public sector Indian Bank onThursday announced five special emergency loans for itscustomers, including corporate clients, Self-Help Groups,retail borrowers and pensioners.The five special emergency loans -- the IND-COVIDEmergency Credit Line for corporate customers, IND-MSE COVIDEmergency loan for micro, small and medium enterprises, SHG-COVID (SAHAYA Loan) for self help groups, IND-COVID emergencysalary loan for retail borrowers and an emergency pension loanfor pensioners, the city-based bank said in a press release."In these challenging times, Indian Bank is committed tostand by its customers. We expect that these credit lines willmeet the immediate liquidity requirements of businesses,"Indian Bank Managing Director Padmaja Chunduru said."SHGs has always been an important part of our businessand with our initiatives we ensure that the group gets all thedesired support for financial independence," she said."We have made these loans repayable over a longer periodbusiness is back on track again," Chunduru, who is also theCEO of the bank, said. The IND-COVID Emergency Credit Line would provideadditional funding of upto 10 per cent of the working capitallimits (both fund based and non-fund based limits) with amaximum limit of Rs 100 crore.Large corporates and medium enterprises would be eligiblefor the loan.The tenure of the loan would be for 36 months with aninitial moratorium of upto six months and would carry fixedinterest rate of 1 year MCLR (Marginal Costs of Funds-basedLending Rate), the release added. VIJ APRRAVINDRANATH APRRAVINDRANATH

Indian Bank unveils five special emergency loans

Mumbai, Apr 22 () Nearly 80 per cent of micro and small business (MSEs) in the country have been impacted negatively as the economic activities have come to a standstill due to the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a survey. The survey showed that only 24 per cent of MSEs are operational now, of which 18 per cent are operating at less than 50 per cent capacity. The findings are based on a survey of 420 players in 12 cities by market research and consulting firm, Kantar. These respondents were from sectors such as manufacturing, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), IT/ IT-enabled services (ITES) / telecom, travel, transport, logistics, retail and outlets, education and related areas, and other professional services sectors. "79 per cent of the MSEs are negatively impacted by the COVID-19 crisis," the survey showed. The sectors that are hit majorly by the COVID-19 crisis include travel, transport, and logistics industry. Seven of the 10 MSE players have seen a substantial decline in customer footfalls or enquiries during the past few weeks, it said. According to Kantar's executive vice president (insights division) Biswapriya Bhattacharya, MSEs were already facing turbulent times since the past one year, and the present crisis has affected them very severely. "Only 80 per cent of MSEs have less than three months of working capital," he said. The survey showed that five out of 10 businesses would run out of their working capital within two months and they will depend on loans from peers or friends or family to survive. Seven of ten manufacturing businesses are unlikely to procure raw materials for the next one month. The survey showed that restricted movements, low demand from customers, financial and workforce woes are leading to high level of customer-oriented challenges for these MSEs. Small businesses having 11 to 100 employees are majorly looking for opportunities to drive their business in this crisis situation through tech adoption, sales/marketing strategies, it said. HV ANSANS

Nearly 80 pc MSEs hit as economic activities come standstill amid COVID-19: Survey

New Delhi, Feb 2 () The Union Budget 2020-21 has earmarked an all-time high allocation of Rs 7,572.20 crore for the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises while announcing a string of initiatives for the sector including raising the turnover threshold for audit of their accounts to Rs 5 crore and a scheme to provide subordinate debt to MSME entrepreneurs.
 The flagship employment generation scheme of the ministry, Prime Minister Employment Generation Programme, has got an all-time high allocation of Rs 2,500 crore for generating self-employment opportunities through establishment of micro-enterprises in non-farm sector by helping traditional artisans and rural/urban unemployed youth.
 "Currently, only businesses having a turnover of more than Rs 1 crore are required to get their books of accounts audited by an accountant. In order to reduce compliance burden on small retailers, traders, shopkeepers who comprise the MSME sector, I propose to raise by five times the turnover threshold for audit from the existing Rs 1 crore to 5 crore," Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said while presenting the Budget in Parliament on Saturday.
 She said a scheme will be introduced to provide subordinate debt to MSME entrepreneurs.
 Besides, the government has also asked the Reserve Bank to extend the debt restructuring window for MSMEs by a year to March 31, 2021, Sitharaman said.
 "An app-based invoice financing loans product will be launched. This will obviate the problem of delayed payments and consequential cash flow mismatches for the MSMEs," the finance minister said.
 She further said necessary amendments will be made to the Factor Regulation Act 2011 to enable non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) to extend invoice financing to MSMEs through TReDS, thereby enhancing the economic and financial sustainability.
 A scheme of Rs 1,000 crore was also announced to extend hand holding support to mid-sized companies in selected sectors such as pharmaceuticals, auto components and others for technology upgradations, R&amp;D, business strategy, among others, to make them export competitive.
 The Khadi Vikas Yojana and Gramodyog Vikas Yojana has been allocated Rs 472 crore to develop a sustainable model of Khadi based business enterprises in the villages.
 The allocation under MSE-Cluster Development Programme has witnessed an increase of 71 per cent to Rs 391 crore from Rs 228 crore in 2019-20 for enhancing productivity, competitiveness and capacity building of Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs).
 Allocation for 'Scheme of Fund for Regeneration of Traditional Industries' (SFURTI) has gone up to Rs 465 crore from Rs 125 crore in the previous year to help traditional industries become more productive, profitable and capable of generating sustainable employment for artisans.
 Besides, Rs 805 crore has been allocated under Credit Linked Capital Subsidy and Technology Upgradation Scheme (CLCS-TUS) to improve competitiveness of MSMEs through various interventions aimed at upgrading technology. 
 The National Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe Hub is given Rs 150 crore to provide professional support to SC/ST entrepreneurs and capacity building among existing and prospective SC/ST entrepreneurs through training programmes. RSN RVK

MSME Ministry allocated Rs 7,572 cr in Budget

(Eds: Incorporating related stories) New Delhi, Mar 25 () In a bid to help people and businesses affected in the wake of coronavirus outbreak, state-owned lenders including Indian Bank, Union Bank of India and Bank of Baroda on Wednesday announced special emergency loan products. Besides, other public sector lenders -- Canara Bank, UCO Bank and Indian Overseas Bank -- too announced emergency credit line for customers. Public sector banks with about 80 per cent of banking operation have taken steps to ensure the safety of its staff and uninterrupted banking services to customers. "In these challenging times, the bank is committed to stand by its customers. Keeping in view the hardships faced by various sectors of the economy, we have launched products to take care of immediate liquidity requirement of businesses and retail customers," Indian Bank managing director Padmaja Chunduru told . "In wake of #coronavirus outbreak, #UnionBankofIndia unstintingly supports all its existing customers with the launch of Covid Emergency Line of Credit (CELC) which provides additional credit facilities to tide over liquidity issues," Union Bank of India said in a tweet. Another state-run lender Bank of India too announced emergency line of credit for borrowers. Bank of Baroda said it has set up an emergency credit line to provide funds to its existing MSME and corporate borrowers impacted by the outbreak of coronavirus. This follows a similar additional funding facility announced by the country's largest lender State Bank of India for its borrowers, last week. "Canara Bank announces special Loan schemes for our MSME/Corporate/Business/ Agri &amp; Retail Customers, to tide over the liquidity / Cash flow mismatches in the wake of outbreak of COVID -19," the bank tweeted. Indian Overseas Bank launched MSME Product "COVID 19 Line of Support Scheme" for all MSME customers. More banks to follow suit and announce special emergency credit line in days to come. Last week, the country's largest lender State Bank of India also announced an emergency credit line to meet any liquidity mismatch for its borrowers. Sharing details, she said, IND- COVID Emergency Credit Line (IBCECL) for large corporates will provide additional funding of up to 10 per cent of the Working Capital Limits (both Fund Based and Non Fund Based limits) with a maximum limit of Rs 100 crore. Large Corporates and Medium Enterprises that are in the Standard Category would be eligible for this loan, she said, adding the loan tenor will be for 36 months with an initial moratorium of up to 6 months and would carry fixed interest rate of 1 year MCLR. For MSME sector, she said, IND- MSE COVID Emergency Loan is aimed at providing additional funding of 10 per cent of fund based working capital limits with max Rs 50 lakhs. The will have tenure of up to 60 months and there will not be any processing fee. To support the women workforce, the bank has launched the SHG-COVID - SAHAYA LOAN. Under this each member can avail a soft loan of Rs 5000 up to maximum of Rs 1 lakh per SHG. The loan is for 36 months with 6 months moratorium. Indian Bank is servicing 1.68 lakh SHGs with more than 22 lakh women beneficiaries and the product will help them tide over the crisis, she said. For salaried class, the bank has designed IND-COVID Emergency Salary Loan under which one can avail loan up to an amount equivalent to 20 times latest monthly gross salary subject to max of Rs 2 lakhs. Available at concessional rate, this will help meet urgent medical and other expenditure, she said. "We expect that these credit lines will meet the immediate liquidity requirements of businesses. SHGs has always been an important part of our business and with our initiatives we ensure that the group gets all the desired support for financial independence. We have made these loans repayable over a longer period of time to give them the flexibility in operations until business is back on track again. With salaried class and the pensioners, it is more a line to meet their immediate requirements," she said. Talking about efforts made by the bank to keep its staff safe, Chunduru said, the bank is deploying 50 per cent staff on alternate basis. Besides, she said, masks, sanitizers are being ensured and a helpline number manned by a team of doctors has been started for staff and their families to address the query related with the disease. She said, the bank is also identifying non-critical roles would be identified to enable implementation of the work-from-home policy. The bank is also dissuading its customers not to visit bank branches and do transaction through Digital Banking Services (DBS) in order to protect themselves from the coronavirus. The bank is promoting digital payments such as mobile banking, internet banking, debit and credit cards instead of using cash which may require them to go to crowded places for paying bills. To familiarise people about digital payment methods, she said, the bank has designed videos which inform customers about step by step use. For pensioners, she said, the bank is taking extra effort to provide cash at their doorstep as these people are more prone to virus attack. DP MKJ

Banks launch special emergency loans for customers amid COVID-19 crisis

In what could be a blessing of sorts for <keyword id="770060" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Indian-start-ups">Indian start-ups</keyword>, the government has decided to exempt all start-ups from the prior experience criteria in public procurement. Until now, only micro and small enterprises enjoyed this privilege. 
 
As per a directive issued by the department of expenditure to all ministries, all start-ups -- "micro, small or otherwise" -- may now be exempted from certain eligibility criteria in the tendering process. 
 
After this decision, start-ups in the manufacturing sector will get equal opportunities as the established companies, enabling them to participate in such tenders with relaxed eligibility conditions. 
 
Also read: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Start-up-launch-legal-procedures/articleshow/53518726.cms">Want to launch your startup? Here are the legal procedures</a> 
 
It was in March this year, when PM Modi had launched the Start-up India initiative that the Micro Small and Medium Enterprises had ministry issued an order to all ministries and central public sector units to relax conditions asking for prior experience and turnover for start-ups in all public procurements. 
 However, since the order only mentioned small and micro enterprises covered by the <keyword id="779097" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="Public-Procurement-Policy">Public Procurement Policy</keyword> for MSE order 2012, all start-ups were not able to make use of this relaxation. 
 
Also read: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Delhis-cafes-are-turning-into-work-spaces-for-Indias-startup-hustlers/articleshow/53321713.cms">Delhi’s Cafes are turning into work-spaces for India’s Startup hustlers</a> 
 
"The latest order has now put to rest earlier confusion over which start-ups are eligible for such benefits," a senior official told <a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/startups/all-startups-are-now-eligible-for-exemption-from-any-prior-experience-in-public-procurement/articleshow/53515664.cms">ET</a>. 
 
The public procurement policy asks for central government department and ministries and its central PSUs to procure at least 20% of their purchases from micro and small enterprises, beginning April 1, 2015. 
 
<a href="http://www.mdy.co.uk/site-images/procurement.jpg">Image source</a>

Good news for start-ups! No prior experience in public procurement required to get tenders

Amid 10 state-run lenders suffering losses of over Rs 15,000 crore in the March quarter, Finance Minister <keyword id="42575" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Arun-Jaitley">Arun Jaitley</keyword> has promised greater capital support to banks while warning that defaulters cannot be allowed to "sleep well", leaving all the worry to bankers. 

	He also rejected suggestions that huge losses being posted by public sector banks (PSBs) were like "skeletons tumbling out", saying NPAs were mostly due to business-related losses in certain sectors, rather than due to frauds, and one must "distinguish between chalk and cheese". 
 

	Jaitley, who was on a six-day visit to Japan to attract investments, said the losses were because of provisioning to cover for bad debt and most of the banks including State Bank of India and PNB had good profits at operational level. 
 

	"Look at the balance sheets of these banks. Punjab National Bank operationally had a good profit, SBI had a good profit. It is the provisioning which makes it look like a loss," the Finance Minister told PTI. 
 

	Stating that non-performing assets (NPAs) or bad loans have always been there, Jaitley said: "Whether you keep it below the carpet or you bring it into the balance sheet... I think a transparent balance sheet is the best way of doing business and that's what the banks are today doing. 
 

	"I am very clear, the government will fully strengthen the banks and fully support the banks where it is needed. I have declared a figure in the Budget , but I am willing to look at a higher figure if that is necessary." 
 

	On measures being taken to empower the banks, he said bankruptcy law is one empowerment while the strategic debt restructuring (SDR) mechanism of RBI is also there. 
 

	"What we are doing to several other recovery laws the Securitisation, Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT) itself is an empowerment. Therefore you cannot indefinitely have a situation where people who owe money sleep well and bankers have to worry. I think the people who owe these monies will also have to act," he said. 
 

	Asserting that all NPAs are not bank frauds, he said there may be some improper loans but there were a large volume of loans resulting from business losses or on account of sectoral losses. 
 

	"The loans were rightly given, sectors haven't done well. So to say that these are all skeletons stumbling out (is not correct). A business loss is not a skeleton. A skeleton is something which is done as a scam or a scandal and therefore we must be careful to distinguish between chalk and cheese as far as the banking NPAs are concerned," he said. 
 

	The Finance Minister said once the problem climaxes and the sectoral results start turning over, the situation would change. 
 

	Citing the example of PNB, he said the bank last year made a Rs 12,000 crore operational profit, which is not a low level of profit, but it declared loss because of NPA provisioning. "So it is the balance sheet provisioning which has led to that situation." 
 

	These NPA loans were not given recently, Jaitley added. 
 

	"These are old loans which relates to sectors which have been under stress. Those sectoral problems have been addressed significantly. In many of those sectors, the balance sheet has started changing and therefore slowly it must relate to the banks itself and reflect on their balance sheet," he said. 
 

	Against the backdrop of mounting bad loans and record losses of public sector banks, Jaitley will hold a quarterly performance review on Monday with the heads of PSBs and Financial Institutions. 
 He would "review the overall performance of PSBs during the financial year 2015-16 as well as with regard to the flow of credit to agriculture, insurance and MSE sectors among others", the <keyword id="47209" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="20" keywordseo="Finance-Ministry">Finance Ministry</keyword> said in a statement.

Defaulters, you won't be allowed to sleep well, warns Arun Jaitley

<div style="padding: 15px; border: 1px solid #999999; margin-bottom: 10px; font-size: 15px!important; line-height: 25px; overflow: auto; vertical-align: middle;"> This is part of the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/tech-360">"Tech 360"</a> series offering a 360-degree view of the tech industry, from in-depth reporting to weekly posts on what you need to know. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/tech-360">"Tech 360"</a> is sponsored by Delta. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/tech-360">Read more in the series »</a><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/tech-360" target="_blank"></a></div><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image">iRobotiRobot CEO and co-founder Colin Angle</div></div></div>iRobot's autonomous housecleaning robots are already in millions of homes around the world. Spare your sci-fi dreams of humanoid robots fetching your beers for now - this is the only consumer robotics company that matters today.
If you don't know the company name, you certainly know its products. To date, iRobot has sold 10 million housecleaning Roomba vacuums, saving its customers time and effort in one aspect of that thing we all hate so much: housework.
The company is built on much more than vacuums, however - its other consumer offerings will wash your floors, clean your pool, and even clear out your gutters.
iRobot also has an impressive business selling battle-tough bots to military and police - <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/irobot-defense-contractor-2014-4">we profiled that side of its business here</a>. These bots are used for a variety of applications, having been put to work in Afghanistan at the height of the war, and even in Fukushima, Japan after the reactor meltdown.
One of the people at iRobot's helm is its CEO and co-founder, Colin Angle, 46, who recently gave us some time for questions. Here are some takeaways from our conversation, and the full (lightly edited) interview appears below that.
<ul>
<li>iRobot is interested in eventually building robots to help the elderly lead more comfortable lives. We're rapidly aging as a society, so robots might be just the thing to step in and help us out in our twilight years.</li>
<li>Humanoid robots are not practical. Function is more important than form, so a robot's utility needs to come first.</li>
<li>The idea of a "robot uprising" is not really something to worry about. Long before humanity needs to worry about that, we're going to need to solve much more interesting problems. One is to answer the question "What is 'human?'"</li>
<li>The next generation of Roombas will use a superior navigation technology called vSLAM. They're going to navigate around your house more efficiently with help from low-cost cameras that will help them keep track of where they already have and haven't yet cleaned.</li>
</ul>
BUSINESS INSIDER: What got you interested in robotics?
COLIN ANGLE: A passion for building things, and to have those things be more than just a fantasy - to be quite practical.
"Star Wars" was the right movie for me. I watched the <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/MSE-6-series_repair_droid">MSE-6 droid</a> leading the stormtroopers where they needed to go when they were under attack, and that got my attention much moreso than C-3PO and R2-D2 because we could actually build that.
Robots had so much potential but none of it had been reduced to practice. We were going to make the robot industry real by ignoring all notions of what a robot was "supposed" to be - form that met function. It wasn't about the "cool demo." I had lots of experience around cool demos, especially at MIT. I was interested in the longer term, playing in the space where robots could be in the consumer or commercial world.
BI: Your company's name is a reference to Isaac Asimov's "I, Robot", I assume?
CA: It is, but at the time, the "i" stood for "internet." The original name of the company was Artificial Creatures Inc. Around the late 1990s, I'd become convinced that one of the killer applications of robotics came from connecting robots to the internet. The idea of solving generalized artificial intelligence was still far away, but heck, I could rent brains by hiring operators. iRobot was the name of the company and one of our most ambitious projects, <a href="http://www.irobot.com/filelibrary/ppt/corp/cool_stuff_ppt/img13.html">iRobot LE</a>. It was an internet-connected robot, but it was ultimately not launched.
<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image">iRobot</div></div></div>
BI: Do you have any favorite robot books or movies?
CA: There are many of them. "Star Wars" was an early inspiration. Johnny Five from the "Short Circuit" movies. "WALL-E" is a movie about a trash-collecting robot, so how can I not love that? It celebrates a practical, mundane robot that goes about its life.
BI: In the time since you and your co-founders started iRobot, what have been the most impressive developments in the field?
CA: It's hard not to love Roomba. Roomba had such an amazing impact on the field. When we launched, we asked people, "Is it a robot?" and got an overwhelming no - "robots" have arms and legs, they command data. There was a very strong perception that robots had to look like people. Roomba didn't use the word "robot" other than in the company name on the packaging. The press called it a robot. Now here we are 10 years later. I think, as a result, people are generally willing to imagine robots of all shapes, as humanoid robots are not practical.
The other thing Roomba did was to demonstrate that if you can crack the code and make a robot that delivers more value than it costs, you can sell 10 million of them. The utility of the robot needs to come first. It's business model over technology.
When I was building robots in the early 1990s, the problems of voice recognition, image understanding, VOIP, even touchscreen technologies - these were robotics problems. Now a robot company would be crazy to be working on those types of challenges. The gaming industry has stepped in to solve those problems. The Kinect sensor is perfect for gesture recognition, for example. These advances from the technology side have opened up room for advancement in the robot space. That's exciting because to create new value in the robot space quickly, you need to stand on the shoulders of other technological developments. Starting from scratch can be a five- or ten-year project. If you can leverage a growing infrastructure of rich technologies, you can start to build more useful robots with less capital investment, and that's what's required to succeed.
<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image">iRobotThe 310 SUGV, one of iRobot's military and defense robots.</div></div></div>
BI: This is such a clichéd question, but where do you stand on the robot uprising?
CA: Long before we have a robot uprising, we're going to deal with much more interesting problems. This idea that we're going to build a robot that has human cognition and appreciation for morals and values, that's super-hard stuff. If you think about the incorporation of robotic technology in our bodies, that's much nearer at hand.
There are implants with robotic technologies can restore hearing, and we're starting to have more routine surgery facilitated by robots. We have people who have lost their limbs in tragic situations who now have thought-controlled arm, legs, or ankles incorporated directly into their bodies.
Thus far, this technology is being used in response to traumatic injury, but it's easy to imagine your daughter coming to you one day and saying, "Hey Dad, I was thinking of having my eye removed. An artificial eye is going to give me better sight. Forget Google Glass, let's have the technology built in."
This is plausible and will create new challenges in the world. Having access to this technology gives you advantages over people who don't. The more important question is "What is human?"
BI: How does iRobot decide on what to work on next? Anything cool in the works you can talk about?
CA: We obviously continue to work on extending our leadership in markets we currently serve, but the impact of mobile and gaming asks the question "What is robot technology?" The answer is navigation, manipulation, and implementation of more sophisticated intelligence. The idea that a robot will become more aware of its environment, that telling it to "go to the kitchen" means something - navigation and understanding of the environment is a robot problem. Those are the technological frontiers of the robotics industry.
Where are we going? Extending independent living for our elderly is certainly not the only market for robots - there are robots in oil wells and many other things - but it's in that direction. We are rapidly aging as a society and most developed nations are suffering from the same challenges. In the U.S., there is an 18% gap on healthcare services for those in later life and the average cost of assisted living is well over the cost of a mortgage on a home.
BI: I read that the next generation of Roombas will implement something called "vSLAM." What can you tell me about vSLAM, and how much better will a vSLAM Roomba be than one that relies solely on bumpers and sensors? 
CA: Navigation is a key robot technology so vSLAM is about map-building and visualizing yourself on a map. "SLAM" stands for "simultaneous location and mapping" - the robot drives through an environment and builds a map of its environment. At the same time it keeps a running estimate of its position within that map, and to do it well right now is relatively expensive. It requires long-range laser rangefinders to build this map effectively. It works great in commercial setting, but the big challenge is cost.
vSLAM stands for "visual" SLAM. Instead of lasers, we're using low-cost cameras. The robot moves around just like with SLAM, but the map it makes is based on cameras finding landmarks in its environment that it can recognize from a variety of angles and lighting. Tracking three landmarks means you can triangulate your position very accurately.
The cost of the hardware decreases from thousands of dollars to tens of dollars, and that opens up many new applications for the technology and robots in general. At our <a href="http://investors.irobot.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=193096&amp;p=irol-newsArticle&amp;ID=1924345&amp;highlight=">Analyst Day</a> we demonstrated a system in the lab and used it to move around a building. We're very excited about it.
In practical consumer terms, Roomba will have an understandable map of what it's doing. This means it can spend more time where the dirt is and less time where it isn't. It can cover more square footage in the same amount of time, or the same square footage in less time. You can stop and recharge, then continue where you left off. It's about having the knowledge about what's been done where.

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