Ep 68: Personal Agency and Shaping One's Own Life (w/Chang Liu)

🎙️ I spoke with Chang Liu, founder and CEO of Extend Robotics, a startup developing intuitive VR interfaces to control robot arms and train AI models using real-world data.

Chang shares his story from growing up in China to moving to the UK for university, studying at Newcastle and Southampton, and completing a PhD in aerial robotics. After postdoc work at Imperial College on autonomous drone systems, he made the leap into entrepreneurship and started Extend Robotics.

We talk about the early pivots (from drone teleoperation to building lightweight robotic arms) and how the company eventually focused on software, helping users control off-the-shelf robot arms through an easy-to-use VR interface.

Chang explains how they’re now using this interface to collect high-quality data for AI training, with real-world pilots in agriculture, EV manufacturing, and satellite servicing. The goal is to go from teleoperation to automation, and to make robot training as accessible as robot control.