In this episode, I talk with Aaron Tan, PhD, Co-founder of Syncere, where he’s reimagining domestic robotics:
A robotic lamp capable of folding laundry!
One single video of the concept went viral, pulling in over 4 million views and sparking thousands of conversations online.
We talk about growing up in Taiwan, immigrating to Canada as a teenager, and how a Lego Mindstorms kit from his father kicked off a lifelong obsession with robots. Aaron walks me through his path from a Bachelor’s and Master’s at Ontario Tech University, to a PhD at the University of Toronto, and a postdoc at Stanford... and why he chose the Bay Area to build Syncere.
He also shares the story behind Lume’s design, inspired by Beauty and the Beast, and explains why he believes the future of home robotics shouldn’t look like humanoids. We talk about building in public, customer psychology, and what it’s like creating a product people can’t wait to have in their homes.
