In this exclusive CanadianSME Small Business Magazine interview, Ulys Sorok, Founder and CEO of GRAM (Galactic Resource Advancement Mechanism), shares his bold vision for reshaping the world of physical innovation through self‑replicating robotics. Driven by a belief that humanity must reclaim progress in the “world of atoms,” Sorok leads GRAM in developing autonomous insectoid robots capable of constructing and maintaining infrastructure on Earth and beyond. His work merges engineering precision with civilizational ambition—advancing toward a future where technology fuels expansion, agency, and a truly galactic human destiny.
Ulys Sorok is the founder and CEO of GRAM (Galactic Resource Advancement Mechanism), a SR (Self-Replication) company developing autonomous, meter-scale, general purpose insectoid robots. His work combines industrial pragmatism with a broader civilizational vision, advancing toward a future where robotic swarms can construct, repair, and maintain the world’s infrastructure independently.
GRAM’s vision centers on making humanity galactic by engineering self-replicating robotics. How did your experience with “stagnation in the world of atoms” inspire the founding mission and product strategy at GRAM?
We are living through the Great Seduction. Our society is infatuated with progress in the “world of bits”, while the physical world, the “world of atoms”, stagnates. This is a path that we are heading towards, one that we have been heading towards for quite some time now. I am wary of complacency, at the societal scale, at the cost of agency and the realization of humanity’s potential.
Making humanity galactic is my mission, it is GRAM’s mission as well. Quintillions of humans across billions of stars. It is irrational, because it must be. We need an absolute counterweight for the Introspective Future that stands before us, one that pushes us towards greater and greater agency.
The question in founding GRAM was guiding humanity to the path of least resistance for the Galactic Future. The path to opposing the tyranny of an Introspective Future. We are the company of creation, heralding the technology of SR (Self-Replication), the principle by which nature herself solved for growth over four billions years ago.
Insectoid α aims to redefine intervention-work in industrial settings. Why do you believe insectoid robots, rather than humanoids, offer the optimal path for industry and eventually for space?
I seek to focus on function, not form. Nature has ran this experiment for me over 500 million years. The product of this is the insectoid, our autonomous, six-limbed hexapod. It has been carefully engineered to be more stable, precise, energy-efficient, and scalable to manufacture in the trillions.
As established prior, GRAM’s principle is more than just observation. For our first product, this materializes itself in the form of our target of doing intervention-work. Existing platforms (drones, quadrupeds) are built for observation. True economic value is produced by physically changing the real world, not merely diagnosing it. While humanoids are destined for the service economy, rearranging the same atoms within set enclosures, our insectoids will build the physical infrastructure for our galactic future, from the shipyards of Earth today to the Martian industries of tomorrow.
Self-replication is at the heart of your approach. How does achieving true self-replication fundamentally change the economics and scalability of robotics for global industries?
One core statement is the goal of dropping the Cost of Capable Labor (CCL) to its absolute floor, the price of raw materials and energy. Linear scaling will lead to the dearth of options for critical physical industries and will restrict humanity’s trajectories significantly.
All that matters for now is that GRAM seeks to ultimately deploy millions of insectoids as the base unit of labor across every physical industry to exist, supporting operations in energy, mining, construction, transportation, infrastructure, and manufacturing.
Your recent announcement of GRAM North signals a desire to collaborate within and beyond Canada. What unique role do you see Canadian workers, industries, or ecosystems playing in the deployment and evolution of these technologies?
Our North initiative recognizes Canada as one of the few regions where “frontier” engineering, community-led research, and extreme environment industry intersect. Making Canada a natural choice for rugged autonomous robot testing.
GRAM NORTH is more than just an expansion, but as a collaboration with local operators, trades, and universities to pioneer a new form of community robotic design, where field insight guides the evolution of self replication. In this sense it’s not just a test site, but an incubator for the culture and ethics of autonomy that will define how these machines work for humanity at planetary scale.
Recently, we hosted the World’s Largest Swarm Robotics Hackathon at University of Waterloo. 100 of Canada’s brightest students attended, competing intensely to build 500+ robots. We recruited the winners of the hackathon to join our company. Judges included Ulys Sorok (CEO of GRAM), Dr. Justin Werfel (Top Harvard Swarm Researcher), and Damion Shelton (Founder of Agility Robotics).
As one of Canada’s most ambitious founders, what final thoughts or advice would you share with small and medium-sized businesses aiming to push the boundaries of what’s possible?
Reject complacency. Do not succumb to the siren call of a stagnating society that rewards patience and introspection. We live in a time where the urgent need for physical innovation is drowned out by digital noise.
Focus on the world of atoms. True economic value requires altering physical reality. If your vision demands a radical departure from the status quo, they will call it irrational. Let it be.
Adopt a wartime mentality. Time herself stands against us. Understand the significance of the coming decades. We are at war against stagnation. Do not will merely to understand the universe; will to transform it. The future does not permit you to stand on the sidelines.
