Star Wars BDX droids showcased at Disney’s “Season of the Force” event.
Disney has teamed up with Nvidia and Google DeepMind to develop an open-source physics engine that will assist robots in mastering intricate tasks.
The company aims to introduce entertainment robots at its theme parks.
During a keynote speech, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang interacted with an endearing robot named Blue, who communicated in classic robot sounds.
This heartwarming moment marked the debut of a collaboration between Disney Research, Nvidia, and Google DeepMind to create Newton, an open-source physics engine designed to enhance the capabilities of robots like Blue in handling complex tasks more effectively.
By utilizing the Nvidia Warp framework, Disney Research intends to utilize this cutting-edge technology to enhance the realism and expressiveness of its robotic characters.
Disney Research plans to be the first to deploy Newton in upgrading its robotic character platform, yielding next-generation entertainment robots.
The audience at Huang’s keynote address cheered as the Star Wars-inspired droid Blue made its entrance. These droids, set to appear at Walt Disney World, Tokyo Disneyland, and Disneyland Paris this year, were showcased alongside Jon Favreau and Disney Imagineers at the 2025 SXSW Conference & Festivals.
Disney Imagineers previously unveiled the robots at a Disney event in 2023, where three robots roamed the “Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge” attraction at Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
While Disney has a long history of using audio-animatronic figures in its park attractions, the new droids signify a significant advancement in the company’s robotic technology.
Huang’s conversation with Blue during the presentation showcased the potential for human-robot interaction, as Blue responded to queries with beeps and gestures controlled by a human operator.
Huang emphasized that this collaboration with Disney Research, Nvidia, and Google DeepMind is integral to Disney’s vision of bringing characters to life in groundbreaking ways.
In addition to the BDX droids, Nvidia introduced a humanoid robot foundational model called Isaac GR00T N1, marking the beginning of a series of customizable models to be pre-trained and released to global robotics developers.
As robots continue to evolve with the rapid progress of AI, Nvidia stands at the forefront of innovation in the industry, driving advancements through its AI computing chips.
The potential for robots in various applications is expanding rapidly, and Huang expressed his excitement for the future of robotics during the GTC conference.
Humanoid robots are expected to replace factory workers within a few years instead of decades. Huang emphasized that this is not a problem that is five years away. At the end of his keynote address, Huang acknowledged Disney’s droid, saying, “Okay, Blue. Let’s go home. Good job.” Google representatives did not provide a comment in response to a request from Business Insider.
