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I Saw Ecovacs' New Self-Washing Robot Vacuums That Make Mopping Cleaner

I Saw Ecovacs' New Self-Washing Robot Vacuums That Make Mopping Cleaner

CNET13-05-2025

Robot mops aren't really a new concept; they've existed for a few years now with mopping pad attachments and dispensers for cleaning solution and water. However, many are just glorified Swiffers. They smear dirty water around your floors and call it "cleaning." But Ecovacs' Deebot X9 Pro Omni and T80 Omni try to fix that problem with a self-washing mop that, in theory, won't turn your floor into a petri dish.
"With Ozmo Roller Mop technology, we're addressing the hygiene gaps traditional mops leave behind, while innovations like Blast suction and ZeroTangle 3.0 take performance and convenience to the next level," David Qian, CEO of Ecovacs Robotics, said in a news release.
I got an early look at these robot mops in a Brooklyn coffee shop ahead of their launch. While they're not cheap, starting at $1,200 for the T80 Omni and $1,600 for the X9 Pro Omni, they have a lot of mopping tech that should help make mopping your living space quicker and more hygienic.
The X9 Pro Omni tackled a milk spill with ease.
Ajay Kumar
Self-washing robots
The headline feature here is Ecovacs Ozmmo Roller Mop, which first debuted in this year's X8 Pro Omni model. Unlike older robot mops that drag a damp cloth around until it's disgusting, this one has separate clean and dirty water tanks and scrubs the mop pad clean mid-job. It also applies 16 times more pressure than a typical robot mop, so it's closer to an actual hand-scrubbing than a Swiffer.
The Ozmo mop roller on the robot vacuum can pop out to hit corners.
Ajay Kumar
This means your floors get cleaned with fresh water each time instead of reusing old, dirty water. I watched this happen with both the X9 Pro Omni and T80 Omni, where the two robots cleaned up spilled milk from the concrete floor of a coffee shop.
I was impressed that, for the most part, they left no mess or streaks behind, though concrete flooring likely isn't the type of surface you have in your home, so the real test will be on tile, vinyl and other hard flooring. I was also impressed by their ability to navigate the fairly crowded coffee shop. I never saw them bump into people's feet or get caught on furniture or carpets.
The Omni docking station comes with hot air drying.
Ajay Kumar
X9 Pro Omni: The flagship robot mop
The X9 Pro Omni is Ecovacs' new flagship and will set you back the most at $1,599. Here are some of the key features:
The X9 Pro Omni zeroed in on the milk spill.
Ajay Kumar
Blast suction : Its 100-watt motor and redesigned airflow path give it more vacuuming power. The motor has a high-torque, wider air inlet and more precise fan blades.
SuperBoost battery : It comes with Ecovacs' proprietary SuperBoost battery, which the company says can deliver 50% higher discharge current, a 2.5 times longer battery lifespan, and reduced heat output.
ZeroTangle 3.0 brushes: This self-maintaining brush system has a main brush and inward-curved side brush that's designed to eliminate pet hair and other debris from wrapping around it.
The Deebot did a good job of making sure it didn't hit carpet with the mop by lifting the mopping pad.
Ajay Kumar
TruEdge 2.0 3D navigation : Corners are usually a challenge for robot vacuums and mops, which TruEdge is designed to address. It has edge sensing and an extending mop and side brush for cleaning corners and along walls.
Mop lifting : The X9 Pro can detect carpets and automatically raise the mop to prevent your carpets from getting soggy. That's a pretty common feature these days, but it's still nice to see it.
Hot-air drying: The Omni docking station blasts the mop with 145-degree Fahrenheit air, drying it out between uses and preventing bacteria growth.
Is all this necessary? Maybe not, unless you're doing frequent wet mopping at home. (Personally, I usually just vacuum, and my floors are lucky if they get mopped more than once a month.) But if you want the closest thing to a "set it and forget it" robot cleaner -- one that vacuums and mops without you babysitting it -- the X9 Pro Omni might be a good option, though we'll need to put it through its paces at our Louisville vacuum testing lab to see how it performs.
TruEdge 2.0 3D navigation is enhanced by AI to help tackle obstacles and corners.
Ajay Kumar
T80 Omni: Less expensive, still feature-packed
The T80 Omni strips out some of the X9's features but keeps all the important ones. This includes the Ozmo Roller self-washing mop and AI remopping (where it spots sticky spots and hits them twice). According to Ecovacs, it has 16 times more downward pressure than traditional mops and self-washes with every pass, just like the X9 Omni. There's also the ZeroTangle 3.0 brush, which minimizes tangling and picks up debris better.
So what's missing? Well, the docking station uses slightly cooler 113 degrees Fahrenheit air to dry the mop, and the suction isn't quite as strong, but it's still way more capable than some of the more affordable robot vacuums we recommend.
The Ozmo roller self-cleans and the rollers stay tangle free, making it a good option for households with kids and pets.
Ajay Kumar
Price and Availability
These aren't cheap, even on sale at Amazon and Ecovacs' site until May 19. The X9 Pro Omni's MSRP is $1,600, though you can get it for $300 until May 19, bringing it down to $1,300. At full price, the X9 Pro Omni costs as much as the Dreame X50 Ultra, one of the most expensive robot vacuums we recommend due to its ability to cross thresholds and obstacles.
The T50 Omni is $1,200 at full price, but $1,080 if you buy it between May 13 and May 19. The T80 Omni costs as much as our best overall, the Ecovacs Deebot T30S Combo. However, you're paying for the mopping features and superior navigation, so that makes it a bit more understandable.

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The stablecoin evangelist: Katie Haun's fight for digital dollars
The stablecoin evangelist: Katie Haun's fight for digital dollars

TechCrunch

time30 minutes ago

  • TechCrunch

The stablecoin evangelist: Katie Haun's fight for digital dollars

In 2018, when Bitcoin was trading around $4,000 and most Americans, at least, thought cryptocurrency was a fad, Katie Haun found herself on a debate stage in Mexico City opposite Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist who had dismissed digital assets as near worthless. As Krugman focused on Bitcoin's wild price swings, Haun steered the conversation toward something else — stablecoins. 'Stablecoins are really interesting and really important to this ecosystem to hedge against that volatility,' she argued on stage, explaining how digital tokens pegged to the U.S. dollar could offer the benefits of blockchain technology without the volatility of traditional cryptocurrencies. Krugman dismissed the idea entirely. It wasn't exactly a turning point in Haun's career, but it was one moment among others that have helped define it. A former federal prosecutor who had spent more than a decade investigating financial crimes, including creating the government's first cryptocurrency task force and leading investigations into the Mt. Gox hack and corrupt agents in the Silk Road case, Haun had an unusual background for a crypto champion. She wasn't a libertarian ideologue or a tech founder. Coming instead from law enforcement, she understood the criminal potential and legitimate uses of digital assets. By 2018, she had already made history as the first female partner at Andreessen Horowitz, where she co-led their crypto funds. Founding Haun Ventures in 2022, with more than $1.5 billion in assets under management — its team is now investing from a brand-new set of funds that have yet to officially close — she has been even more free to pursue her specific convictions about the future of money. The leap to hanging her own shingle hasn't been without its complexities. Despite her role at a16z and the industry connections that came with it, the two haven't publicly co-invested in anything since early 2022, shortly after she launched her fund, and Haun, who joined the board of Coinbase in 2017, stepped off it last year, while Marc Andreessen, who took colleague Chris Dixon's seat in 2020, remains a director. When asked Wednesday night at TechCrunch's StrictlyVC event about her relationship with Andreessen Horowitz, she downplayed any potential friction while acknowledging they aren't collaborators exactly. 'There's no gentleman's agreement,' she said, echoing this editor's question about whether there's any understanding to avoid competing with her former employer. 'In fact, I still talk to Andreessen Horowitz. You're right that we haven't really done any deals together of late.' Techcrunch event Save $200+ on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Save $200+ on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Boston, MA | REGISTER NOW The apparent lack of co-investment could reflect the cutthroat industry or the challenges associated with leaving one of Silicon Valley's most prominent firms to compete directly with former colleagues. Whatever the case, Haun is now charting her own course, and at the heart of it is stablecoins, which are cryptocurrencies designed to maintain a stable value by being pegged to traditional assets like the U.S. dollar. Unlike Bitcoin or Ethereum, which can swing wildly in value, stablecoins like Circle's USDC or Tether's USDT are meant to trade at exactly $1, creating a digital representation of traditional currency that can move on blockchain networks. Indeed, fast-forward to today, and Haun's belief in stablecoins looks increasingly prescient. Stablecoins — which barely existed in 2015 — now represent a quarter of a trillion dollars in value. They've become the 14th largest holder of U.S. Treasuries globally, recently surpassing both Germany and Norway. For the first time this year, stablecoin transaction volume exceeded Visa's. 'I think people who looked at stablecoins a few years ago thought, what is the value prop?' Haun said Wednesday night. 'You've asked me this before. You said, 'Why do I need stablecoins?' And I said, 'I refer to this as an 'If it works for me, it works for everyone' problem.' In reality, for most Americans, the existing financial system works reasonably well. We have Venmo, bank accounts, credit cards. But Haun, drawing on her prosecutor's understanding of global financial systems, says she has long been aware that the U.S. experience isn't universal. In countries with unstable currencies or limited banking infrastructure, stablecoins offer something unique, she argues, which is instant access to stable, dollar-denominated value that can be sent anywhere in the world for pennies. 'People in Turkey don't think of Tether as a cryptocurrency,' she said Wednesday, 'They think of Tether as money.' The technology has evolved dramatically since those early debates, certainly. Stablecoins once cost $12 to send internationally. And Circle says its USDC stablecoin is fully backed one-to-one by dollars held in JP Morgan bank accounts and audited by Big Four accounting firms. It's important to note that while Circle and Tether are committed to having enough reserves to support their tokens, unlike traditional banks, there's no insured government protection behind these reserves. Still, the corporate world is taking notice in a big way. Walmart and Amazon are reportedly exploring stablecoins, as are other goliaths like Uber, Apple, and Airbnb. The reason is simple economics. Stablecoins provide a way to move the value of U.S. dollars using cryptocurrency rails instead of traditional banking infrastructure, potentially saving these retail-heavy companies billions in processing fees. But the shift has critics worried about economic chaos. If major corporations can issue their own currencies, what happens to monetary policy and banking regulation? The concerns run deeper than just economic disruption. Not all stablecoins are created equal, and many lack the backing and oversight that companies like Circle provide. While well-regulated stablecoins like USDC are backed by actual dollars in U.S. Treasury securities, others operate with less transparency or rely on complex algorithmic mechanisms that have proven vulnerable to collapse. (TerraUSD has had the most specular crash to date, wiping out $60 billion in value when it nosedived.) Corruption concerns in particular came into sharp focus recently when President Donald Trump's family issued its own stablecoin, a move that highlighted potential conflicts of interest in an industry where political influence can directly impact market value and regulatory outcomes. These concerns came to a head as Congress debated the GENIUS Act, legislation that would create a federal framework for stablecoin regulation. The bill passed the Senate early last week with bipartisan support, with 14 Democrats crossing party lines to support it. It now awaits a House vote before potentially reaching the president's desk. But Senator Elizabeth Warren, the ranking member on the Senate Banking Committee, has been particularly vocal in her opposition, calling the legislation a 'superhighway for Donald Trump's corruption.' Her criticism centers on a notable gap in the bill: while it prohibits members of Congress and senior executive branch officials from issuing stablecoin products, it says nothing about their family members. Asked about Warren's concerns on Wednesday night, Haun practically rolled her eyes. 'I think it's really ironic that Elizabeth Warren or other Democrats who do call this corruption are not running to pass crypto legislation,' she said. 'Had there been rules of the road in place [already], there would have been a framework, there would have been clear rules for what's a security, what's a commodity, and what are the consumer protections around that.' Haun, whose venture capital firm has made numerous stablecoin investments including Bridge (acquired by Stripe for reportedly 10 times forward revenue), is largely supportive of the legislation, unsurprisingly. But she has one notable criticism: the bill's prohibition on yield-bearing stablecoins. 'I'm not sure that yield-bearing stablecoins are a good idea for consumers in the U.S., but I'm not sure that a prohibition is a good idea,' she told StrictlyVC attendees. The issue comes down to who profits from the interest earned on stablecoin reserves. Currently, that money goes to companies like Circle and Coinbase. But Haun wonders why consumers shouldn't get that yield, just like they would with a savings account. 'If you had a savings account or checking account and you're getting yield on that, you're getting interest,' she explained. 'What if you just said, 'No, the bank gets interest, not you,' and they're lending out your money?' Haun was less nuanced when it comes to another Warren concern: that if the GENIUS Act is signed into law, stablecoins could become a vehicle for money laundering and terrorism financing. 'Criminals are great beta testers of all technologies,' said Haun. 'But this technology is highly traceable, way more traceable than cash. The largest criminal instrument is the dollar bill.' (According to Haun, the Treasury Department has testified that 99.9% of money laundering crimes succeed using traditional bank wires, not cryptocurrency.) Meanwhile, she said, the regulatory clarity that legislation like the GENIUS Act provides could actually make the system safer by distinguishing between legitimate, well-backed stablecoins from more experimental or risky variants. In fact, as the stablecoin ecosystem continues to mature, Haun sees even bigger changes ahead. She envisions a future where all kinds of assets — from money market funds to real estate to private credit — get 'tokenized' and made available 24/7 to global markets. 'It's just a digital representation of a physical asset,' she explains. 'BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, they've already tokenized their money market funds. That's already happened.' According to Haun, tokenized assets could democratize access to investments in ways similar to how Netflix democratized entertainment. Instead of having to be wealthy enough to meet minimum investment thresholds, someone with $25 and a smartphone could buy fractional ownership in a share of Apple or Amazon, for example. 'Just because something's inevitable doesn't mean it's imminent,' Haun said on Wednesday. But she's confident the transformation is coming, driven by the same forces that made stablecoins successful: they're faster, cheaper, and more accessible than traditional alternatives. Looking back at that 2018 debate with Krugman, Haun's persistence seems to have paid off. A major question now isn't whether digital dollars will reshape the financial system but perhaps more importantly, whether regulators can keep pace with the technology while addressing legitimate concerns about corruption, consumer protection, and financial stability. Haun doesn't seem concerned. While critics point to the fact that stablecoins represent just 2% of global payments, questioning their product-market fit, Haun sees this as a familiar tech adoption story — one that has played out repeatedly and often takes longer than people initially imagine. 'We think it's really early days,' she told the crowd.

From Cognitive Debt To Cognitive Dividend: 4 Factors
From Cognitive Debt To Cognitive Dividend: 4 Factors

Forbes

time31 minutes ago

  • Forbes

From Cognitive Debt To Cognitive Dividend: 4 Factors

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Drawing from insights into physiology, this might be the moment to adopt a cognitive high-intensity interval training. To get started think in terms of four sequential guardrails, the 4 A-Factors — that convert short-term convenience into the long-term dividend of hybrid Intelligence:. Attitude: Set The Motive Before You Type (Or Vibe Code) Mindset shapes outcome. In a company memo published on 17 June 2025, Amazon chief executive Andy Jassy urged employees to 'be curious about AI, educate yourself, attend workshops, and experiment whenever you can'. Curiosity can frame the system as a colleague rather than a cognitive crutch. Before opening a prompt window, write one sentence that explains why you are calling on the model, for example, 'I am using the chatbot to prototype ideas that I will refine myself.' The pause anchors ownership. 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Moratorium on state AI regulation clears Senate hurdle
Moratorium on state AI regulation clears Senate hurdle

Yahoo

time42 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Moratorium on state AI regulation clears Senate hurdle

A Republican effort to prevent states from enforcing their own AI regulations cleared a key procedural hurdle on Saturday. The rule, as reportedly rewritten by Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz in an attempt to comply with budgetary rules, would withhold federal broadband funding from states if they try to enforce AI regulations in the next 10 years. And the rewrite seems to have passed muster, with the Senate Parliamentarian now ruling that the provision is not subject to the so-called Byrd rule — so it can be included in Republicans' 'One Big, Beautiful Bill' and passed with a simple majority, without potentially getting blocked by a filibuster, and without requiring support from Senate Democrats. However, it's not clear how many Republicans will support the moratorium. For example, Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee recently said, 'We do not need a moratorium that would prohibit our states from stepping up and protecting citizens in their state.' And while the House of Representatives already passed a version of the bill that included a moratorium on AI regulation, far-right Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene subbsequently declared that she is 'adamantly OPPOSED' the provision as 'a violation of state rights' and said it needs to be 'stripped out in the Senate.' House Speaker Mike Johnson defended the provision by saying it had President Donald Trump's support and arguing, 'We have to be careful not to have 50 different states regulating AI, because it has national security implications, right?' In a recent report, Americans for Responsible Innovation (an advocacy group for AI regulation), wrote that 'the proposal's broad language could potentially sweep away a wide range of public interest state legislation regulating AI and other algorithmic-based technologies, creating a regulatory vacuum across multiple technology policy domains without offering federal alternatives to replace the eliminated state-level guardrails.' A number of states do seem to be taking steps toward AI regulation. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed a high-profile AI safety bill last year while signing a number of less controversial regulations around issues like privacy and deepfakes. In New York, an AI safety bill passed by state lawmakers is awaiting Governor Kathy Hochul's signature. And Utah has passed its own regulations around AI transparency.

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