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iRobot was founded in 1990 by Rodney Brooks, Colin Angle, and Helen Greiner after working in MIT's Artificial Intelligence Lab.
In 1998, the company received a DARPA research contract which led to the development of the PackBot.
In September 2002, iRobot unveiled its home robots flagship, the Roomba, which sold a million units by 2004.
iRobot began being traded on the NASDAQ in November 2005, under ticker symbol IRBT.
On September 17, 2012, iRobot announced that it had acquired Evolution Robotics, manufacturer of automated floor mopper Mint.iRobot has sold more than 30 million home robots, and has deployed more than 5,000 defense & security robots, as of 2020.In addition to deployment as bomb-disposal units with the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan, PackBots have been used to gather data in dangerous conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster site, and an iRobot Seaglider detected underwater pools of oil after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.iRobot has been criticized for attempting unregulated use of 6240-6740 MHz band, and asking for an FCC exemption to do so. This band is for use for the lawn mowing robot without needing to use an electronic fence as a boundary marker, instead by using radio beacons. The band falls into a band reserved for radio astronomy use, thus interfering with radio telescope observations of methanol's 6.66852 GHz emissions.In February 2016, iRobot announced that it would sell its military robotics business to Arlington Capital Partners, in order to focus more on the consumer market.In November 2021, iRobot announced that it had acquired Aeris Cleantec AG, a Swiss air purifier manufacturer. iRobot began selling Aeris-designed air purifiers through its own brand in 2022.In August 2022, Amazon agreed to buy iRobot in an all-cash deal worth $1.7 billion. The deal is expected to draw antitrust scrutiny from the FTC.
