Beatbot’s new AI-powered robotic pool cleaner skims the surface [Video]

Beatbot is intent on bringing artificial intelligence to automated pool maintenance. It’s all-new iSkim Ultra robotic pool cleaner is a solar-powered skimmer designed to scoop up the debris floating on a swimming pool’s surface with zero input from you.

The robotic skimmer is the less-expensive cousin to the Beatbot Aqua Sense Pro ($2,199), a more advanced bot designed to clean a swimming pool’s floor, walls, waterline, and surface, while at the same time dispensing a chitosan-based cleaning agent. The iSkim Ultra can dispense the same cleaning agent while it’s sweeping the water.

Beatbot touts its operating system as the iSkim Ultra’s prime feature. The OS controls the skimmer’s S-shaped cleaning pattern based on feedback from the unit’s 20 sensors, including three ultrasonic sensors: two at the water’s surface, and one below its water line. The bot also has a six-axis IMU (inertial measurement unit), an electronic device that measures and reports acceleration, orientation, angular rates, and other gravitational forces.

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