Exploring frontier models for physical AI
Bill Doerrfeld | February 28, 2026
My
latest for The New Stack explores the software side of the next era of robotics.
What are the frontier models underlying physical AI? Today, my feature with
The New Stack
looks into the software side of the next era of robotics.
The piece explores new physical AI models like LBM, VLA, and open-world models, and considers the role of edge computing and the enterprise constraints of physical AI at scale.
Thanks to the experts who shared insights for this story!
-Akhil D., senior robotics product marketing manager at
NVIDIA
-MattMalchano, vice president, software,
Boston Dynamics
-Kevin Peterson, CTO,
Bedrock Robotics
-Brian Moore, co-founder and CEO at
Voxel51
In short, the real breakthrough in robotics isn't hardware — it’s in the new class of foundation models physical AI requires.
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