The IDF unveiled a new robotic system that enables its tank mechanics to perform 48 hours of maintenance, including fault location and equipment cleaning, in just two hours.
Developed by the Israeli company Ruby AI, the new IDF robot looks like something out of an animated movie. With multiple robotic arms, kind of like a mechanical octopus, it can penetrate the tank’s engine, clean and wash, scan, and perform operations that previously required a human hand.
The robot operates autonomously, without soldiers present in dangerous environments and without exposure to chemicals, oils, or extreme heat.
Daniel Ben Dov, CEO of Ruby AI, founded the company in the Bar Lev High-Tech Park in Northern Israel. He had previously worked n the space and defense industries, including management positions at Gilat Satellites and Elbit.
The company currently employs about 20 people, most of them engineers in software, hardware, aerospace, and physical artificial intelligence.
Ruby AI’s robotic tank cleaner at work. (Credit: Ruby AI)
“We are developing both the robotic arms themselves and their brains,” explained Ben Dov. “We have developed a Physical AI core that can learn elements of the physical world, understand what it sees, and perform precise actions. This is not a sterile factory robot, but one that can work in mud, dust, heat, and cold.”
The system was developed during the war to take soldiers out of dangerous maintenance chores, and Ben Dov explained that it is now fully operational.
More than just cleaning robots
Founded in 2020, Ruby AI has been working with clients worldwide, with one of its most prominent products being the United Arab Emirates’ refueling robots.
This is the only robot in the world that performs a full refueling without human contact, in an explosive environment, and with strict safety standards.
“If a robot knows how to refuel, it also knows how to deal with hazardous materials,” says Ben Dov. “This opens the door to a whole world of military maintenance.”
Among the developments in the pipeline are robots that will assist in replacing heavy wheels on tanks and bulldozers, a task that currently requires enormous physical effort and poses an injury risk. The robots are capable of holding weights over 100 kilos, performing the operation with the required precision, and working alongside a soldier, taking the most dangerous chores instead of humans.
“We are not developing cute robots that fold laundry,” Ben Dov emphasizes. “We focus on difficult, repetitive physical work in places where a person is not supposed to be.”
From terror tunnels to field hospitals
One of the company’s main objectives is to develop a robot capable of performing a task that is extremely dangerous for a soldier: clearing underground tunnels.
Being close to dangerous areas makes tunnels an ideal environment for mission robots. “A humanoid robot eighty meters tall won’t go in there,” says Ben Dov. “It can’t crawl, it can’t work in mud and water. We design the robot according to the mission, not according to how it looks.”
The world of military medicine is also on the horizon, with the development of five-fingered bionic arms that could, in the future, perform precise therapeutic operations, from physiotherapy to working in dangerous environments such as areas affected by chemical or biological warfare agents, where you don’t want to send a person.
The IDF is examining the developments cautiously, but it’s clear that the direction has been set. The robots are not coming to fight in the place of soldiers, but to relieve them of burdens, risks, and drudgery.