It would seem Alphabet decided to sell robotics maker and Youtube sensation Boston Dynamics because of that outfit’s dedication to humanoid machines. It’s probably not just a matter of economics. While the company’s grown more circumspect about expenses since its restructuring, it retains plenty of businesses unlikely to pay off immediately–or ever. No, the other reason is probably because AlphaDog and Petman and their progenies will be best suited to military operations and the Google guys have vowed to not become part of that industrial complex.

Even without the search giant, though, the military in America (and other countries) will continue to move forward with drones and robotics and even bioengineering because of the fear that THEY may get these tools before WE do. It’s a new arms race, albeit one with robotic limbs.

From Phil Goldstein’s Fed Tech report on 3D-printed drones possibly coming soon to a military near you:

Eric Spero, an acting team lead in the Army Research Lab’s (ARL) Vehicle Technology Directorate, pushed the AEWE to take a closer look at his team’s tests.

“We saw the trajectories of two beneficial technology areas converging in the future,” Spero said, according to the Army release. “The technologies are 3D printing and small unmanned aircraft systems, sometimes referred to as drones.”

In chaotic battlefield environments, the two technologies could provide soldiers with greater flexibility to accomplish missions that require drones. Spero says that his team’s work is not actually about drones, but rather about using 3D printing to let soldiers create useful technologies on the fly.

“It’s about the capability to design and build on-demand. The concept takes advantage of 3D printing as a future enabler and positions us, as the U.S. military, to take advantage of increasingly better manufacturing technologies,” Spero said.

Spero notes in a white paper that 3D-printed drones could give soldiers in the field an edge — on the fly, as it were.•