"Hey Alexa... uh, I mean Atlas, hand me the drill."

Boston Dynamics has a new CEO: Rohit Prasad, the man who built Alexa. And it's a notable break from BD's past.

BD's first two CEOs were hardcore roboticists who helped pioneer the field. Founder Marc Raibert built the legendary MIT Leg Lab and basically invented modern legged locomotion. Robert Playter spent decades deep in the dynamics and control behind Atlas. Robotics people, through and through.

Prasad is an AI leader, not a roboticist. At Amazon he was SVP and Head Scientist for Alexa and AGI, and led the Nova foundation models. Before that, 14 years of ML research at Raytheon BBN.

He's only BD's 3rd CEO ever. The mandate: push their "Physical AI" bet, fusing AI with the robots for industrial deployment, backed by owner Hyundai.

For 30+ years BD led on mechanics and classical control. Now it's betting the next era is won on AI. Big shift.