The U.S. needs millions of new homes. Building them the old way is too slow, too expensive, and too carbon-intensive. I co-founded Reframe Systems to prove that robotics and software can change that equation.

Reframe Systems

Reframe Systems, Feb 2023 — Present

2.5x Faster

35% Cheaper

10x Less Carbon

~500 Homes/yr per microfactory

I co-founded Reframe with Vikas Enti (CEO) and Aaron Small (Head of Operations and Digital AI). I lead Manufacturing, Software, and Robotics, building the full technology stack that powers our microfactory system from the ground up.

Our software-defined, highly automated microfactories produce net-zero homes faster, cheaper, and with a fraction of the carbon of traditional construction. Each microfactory is a compact 50,000 sq ft facility that can launch in roughly 100 days and produce about 500 homes per year, putting manufacturing capacity directly into the communities that need it.

In the Press

Business Wire — Reframe Systems Raises $20M to Scale Microfactories Forbes — Going Micro With A Twist Eliminates Barriers To Offsite Housing Christian Science Monitor — Robots and entrepreneurs work to green the US housing industry

More coverage

The Robot Report — Reframe Systems Uses Robotic Microfactories to Change How We Build Homes Greentown Labs — Building Net-Zero Homes of the Future with Robots and Microfactories Zivid — Integrating 3D Vision for Advanced Robotic Construction Dave Cooper — Ex-Amazon Team Builds Net-Zero Prefab Homes with Robotic Micro-factories

Previously

Senior Robotics System Developer Engineer

Amazon Robotics, Aug 2016 — Jan 2023

Technical Lead for the Sparrow Program, Amazon Robotics' flagship item manipulation system. I built vision-based robotic solutions for singulation, dense packing, item identification, and damage detection, deployed across hundreds of thousands of robotic units in Amazon's fulfillment network.

Amazon — Introducing Sparrow TechCrunch — Amazon debuts Sparrow, a new bin-picking robot arm The Robot Report — Meet Sparrow: Amazon's new item-picking robot

Senior Robotics Engineer — Humanoid Manipulation

WPI-CMU DARPA Robotics Challenge Team, Dec 2013 — Jun 2015

Manipulation Lead for the WPI-CMU team in the DARPA Robotics Challenge. I led full-body motion planning for the 30-DoF Boston Dynamics Atlas humanoid robot, coordinating a team of graduate and undergraduate students through the DRC Trials and Finals.

IEEE Spectrum — DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals: Day 1 Washington Post — The Pentagon's fleet of robots Boston Globe — Success and falls at the robot Olympics

Senior Robotics Software Engineer

Dynamic Legged Systems Lab — Italian Institute of Technology, Jul 2015 — Jul 2016

Built the software architecture for the HyQ and HyQ2Max quadruped robots, integrating real-time controllers, state estimation, and simulation on Xenomai Linux.

IEEE Spectrum — HyQ Quadruped Robot Is Back With Even More Tricks

Education

M.S. Robotics Engineering Worcester Polytechnic Institute, 2014 — GPA: 4.0

B.S. Electrical & Computer Engineering / Robotics Engineering Worcester Polytechnic Institute, 2011 — GPA: 3.8

Patents — 17 Granted US Patents

All patents issued while at Amazon Robotics, covering robotic grasping, end-of-arm tooling, manipulation systems, and safety. View all on Google Patents

Robotic Grasping & End-of-Arm Tools

US12528653 Concentric suction cup tools with integrated air chambers

US12428243 Concentric suction cup tools with integrated brake assemblies

US11492215 Concentric suction cup tools with parallel pistons

US11351678 Dynamically adjustable suction cups

US11207786 Concentric suction cup array for end-of-arm tool

US11084175 End-of-arm tool having concentric suction cups

US11077564 Toroidal suction grippers

US10933537 End of arm tool including feedback

US10611580 Concentric suction cup array including actuators and compliance

US10611037 Concentric suction cup array for end-of-arm tool

US10059007 Finger-aligned extendable gripping mechanisms for item manipulation

Manipulation Systems & Robotics Infrastructure

US12194627 Modular robotic manipulation systems

US11865727 Robotic picking assemblies with different concurrent flow rates

US11623339 Portable robotic manipulation systems

US11534923 Robotic manipulation and frame sensor placement for in-motion object modeling

Safety & Calibration

US11912513 Robotic system camera calibration and localization using robot-mounted registered patterns

US11279035 LIDAR safety rings

Publications

ARMBench — Amazon Robotic Manipulation Benchmark

Chaitanya Mitash, Fan Wang, Shiyang Lu, Vikedo Terhuja, Tyler Garaas, Felipe Polido, Manikantan Nambi, ICRA 2023.

Human-Supervised Control of the ATLAS Humanoid Robot for Traversing Doors

Nandan Banerjee, Xianchao Long, Ruixiang Du, Felipe Polido, Siyuan Feng, Christopher Atkeson, Michael Gennert, Taskin Padir, IEEE Humanoids 2015.

Team WPI-CMU: achieving reliable humanoid behavior in the DARPA Robotics Challenge

Christopher G. Atkeson, Benzun P. W. Babu, Nandan Banerjee, et al. including Felipe Polido, Journal of Field Robotics.

Get in touch

Interested in Reframe Systems, robotics, or just want to connect? Reach me at felipe.polido@gmail.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Felipe Polido
Building the future of housing with Physical AI