10 Open Challenges Steering the Future of Vision-Language-Action Models
Authors
Soujanya Poria
Navonil Majumder
Chia-Yu Hung
Amir Ali Bagherzadeh
Chuan Li
Kenneth Kwok
Ziwei Wang
Cheston Tan
Jiajun Wu
David Hsu
Abstract
Due to their ability of follow natural language instructions, vision-language-action (VLA) models are increasingly prevalent in the embodied AI arena, following the widespread success of their precursors -- LLMs and VLMs. In this paper, we discuss 10 principal milestones in the ongoing development of VLA models -- multimodality, reasoning, data, evaluation, cross-robot action generalization, efficiency, whole-body coordination, safety, agents, and coordination with humans. Furthermore, we discuss the emerging trends of using spatial understanding, modeling world dynamics, post training, and data synthesis -- all aiming to reach these milestones. Through these discussions, we hope to bring attention to the research avenues that may accelerate the development of VLA models into wider acceptability.
