Martinez, California, is about as far as you can get from Silicon Valley and still be in the San Francisco Bay Area. Perched on the northeast edge of the bay, the small city is home to Hello Robot, a startup that itself is about as far as one can get from the maximalist promises of its robotics rivals 45 miles south.
Hello Robot released the fourth iteration of its home assistance robot, Stretch, last month. And you might stretch to call it a humanoid robot. While Stretch boasts a vaguely human torso and sensor-studded head, its telescoping arm has a pair of pinchers, and it rides around on a heavy, omnidirectional wheeled base.
