If you  think you’ve heard the name Andy Rubin before, you probably have. He’s the engineer that created the HipTop for his company Danger. The HipTop was Rubin’s earliest version of how he saw a smartphone. It did quite well for T-mobile and was eventually acquired by Microsoft. Rubin’s career path led him to Google where he created a whole new smartphone operating system, the one we affectionately call Android.

Rubin continued to lead the Android team at Google from it’s inception, release in 2008, and until May of 2013 when he was replaced on the Android team by Chrome executive Sundar Pichai. This move was forecast a year earlier, with an exclusive I received while at SXSW 2012.  At that time it was clear that Google wanted to promote more cross pollination between the Chrome and Android teams.

When the move was finally made, nobody knew what Rubin would end up doing, although he and many other people said he would stay with Google. It was quickly learned that Rubin was going to work on his next “moon shot” and Larry Page, Google’s co-founder and CEO was 100% behind whatever project Rubin was working on.

Well on Wednesday, the New York Times and several other websites like siliconAngle started reporting that Rubin was working on robotics. But not just any robotics, Google is reportedly going big with Rubin’s robotics project, investing millions of dollars on the robotics team and on acquiring startups that fit with the robotics vision.

What that vision is exactly, no one really knows. Google is staying tight lipped about the project, however the New York Times revealed that it would be more along the lines of manufacturing, production and logistics. Although we are years away, one very real possibility is that Rubin could be working on life sized robots that could not only help manufacture products but also help deliver them. And, according to the New York Times, the Google robotics project, is further along than Amazon founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos’, project to use drones to locally deliver packages.

A project like this could take years, “Like any moonshot, you have to think of time as a factor,” Rubin told the New York Times. “We need enough runway and a 10-year vision.”

Before Rubin’s stint at Android, before Danger and before Rubin worked at Apple, he worked at Carl Zeiss as a robotics engineer.

“I have a history of making my hobbies into a career,” Rubin said in a telephone interview. “This is the world’s greatest job. Being an engineer and a tinkerer, you start thinking about what you would want to build for yourself.”

Rubin has a big vision that will most likely materialize. He likened his robotics project to Google’s self driving car project.  “The automated car project was science fiction when it started,” he said. “Now it is coming within reach.”

You can find out more at the New York Times, and here.