Are world models the unlock for Physical AI? | Episode 19

This Week In Startups is made possible by:

Paypal

Today’s show:

*When we think of “Physical AI,” most of us conjure images of humanoid robots and self-driving cars. But there’s a lot more to the category than just breakdancing Chinese bots and Waymos, from excavators autonomously digging tomorrows worksites, to a robot the size of four pizza boxes deploying to the ISS.

Guest host Alex Wilhelm sits down with three founders in the trenches of the Physical AI Space:

Boris Sofman of Bedrock Robotics, which builds autonomous construction equipment

Jeff Hawke of Odyssey, a frontier AI lab specializing in world models for robotics and video games

Ethan Barajas of Icarus Robotics, designers of the free-flying Joy robot that will join the ISS crew in 2027

Guests:

Boris Sofman on X: https://x.com/bsofman

Bedrock Robotics: https://bedrockrobotics.com/

Jeff Hawke on X: https://x.com/jeffrey_hawke

Odyssey: https://odyssey.ml/

Ethan Barajas on X: https://x.com/ethanbarajas11

Icarus Robotics: https://www.icarusrobotics.com/

Relevant Links

Bedrock Excavators Remove 65,000 Cubic Yards of Dirt: https://www.enr.com/articles/61982-bedrock-robotics-excavators-remove-65-000-cubic-yards-of-dirt-on-southwest-project

Odyssey $310M Series B article: https://techcrunch.com/2026/06/17/world-model-maker-odyssey-nabs-1-45b-valuation-backed-by-amazon-and-other-big-names/

Icarus “Joyride” Mission announcement: https://thedebrief.org/icarus-is-building-the-robotic-labor-force-for-space-voyager-technologies-is-sending-a-next-generation-zero-gravity-robot-on-a-joyride-to-space/

PROWL: Prioritized Regret-Driven Optimization for World Model Learning: https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.18803

NVIDIA Cosmos 3 report: https://research.nvidia.com/labs/cosmos-lab/cosmos3/technical-report.pdf

ISS Columbus Laboratory Module: https://www.nasa.gov/international-space-station/columbus-laboratory-module/

NASA’s Astrobee flying robot: https://www.nasa.gov/astrobee/

Voyager Technologies: https://www.voyagerspace.com/

Vast Space: https://www.vastspace.com/

Blue Origin’s New Glenn: https://www.blueorigin.com/new-glenn

“Red Mars” by Kim Stanley Robinson: https://www.amazon.com/Red-Mars-Stanley-Robinson/dp/0553560735

“Rendezvous with Rama” by Arthur C. Clarke: https://www.amazon.com/Rendezvous-Rama-Arthur-Clarke/dp/0553287893

Theo Von “This Past Weekend” podcast: https://www.theovon.com/podcast

Anthropic statement on Fable/Mythos suspension: https://www.anthropic.com/news/fable-mythos-access

Timestamps:

0:00 The Year of Physical AI

1:28 Why everyone's bullish on world models

7:03 Physical AI is harder, but probably bigger

9:08 How to think about world models

16:00 When data becomes "adversarial"

25:00 How Bedrock powers autonomous excavators

30:48 Why teleoperation gets a bad rap

39:10 Meet Joy the space robot

41:33 Laser comms coming to next-gen stations

46:29 Why everyone hates data centers

57:33 When does Claude Fable come back?

Subscribe to the TWiST500 newsletter: https://ticker.thisweekinstartups.com

Check out the TWIST500: https://www.twist500.com

Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp

Follow Lon:

X: https://x.com/lons

Follow Alex:

X: https://x.com/alex

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexwilhelm

Follow Jason:

X: https://twitter.com/Jason

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis

Check out all our partner offers: https://partners.launch.co/

Great TWIST interviews: Will Guidara, Eoghan McCabe, Steve Huffman, Brian Chesky, Bob Moesta, Aaron Levie, Sophia Amoruso, Reid Hoffman, Frank Slootman, Billy McFarland

Check out Jason’s suite of newsletters: https://substack.com/@calacanis

Follow TWiST:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TWiStartups

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/thisweekin

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisweekinstartups

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thisweekinstartups

Substack: https://twistartups.substack.com