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Sony’s Dog Robot to be Launched in the US in coming October

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Aibo
Image Source: wsj.net

Its been around more than two weeks after the Anki’s Vector was launched. Now, Sony has also announced the launch of its Aibo does robot in the US by the coming October this year. Interestingly, The Anki robot has been a success with its launch having a low price of $250. The Sony Aibo, comparatively bigger in size robot has also got more features than the Vector robot and also the price is even higher. The cost of the Aibo robot will be $2,899, and the presale will start in September. Although before delivery they will be exhibited at the Sony Square in Manhattan from Friday through Oct. 14.

The Sony Aibo is a smart dog robot, sleeker than its ancestor Boxy robot and is capable of remembering over 100 different faces, through its OLED-screen eyes. The robot can sense the smile, touch, praise and can play music. It can speak 1,000 words and is enabled with the feature to imitate a real dog, responding to its owner’s commands with a bark. Having a camera on its back and different sensors embedded into it, are helpful to map your house so that it can walk freely in your house. You can add new tricks to its knowledge base and also, using its Aibo app, you can map its activities, give it commands and also manage your house by enabling its camera feature on.

The new Aibo dog robot comes with a charging station, a pink ball and an Airbone. Even having many features included to it, the Aibo robot’s sale may be a little less than the Anki’s Vector due to its high price. As earlier in Japan too its sale was much lesser than the other home robots.

Vector: Anki’s New Smart Home Robot

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Vector Robot
Image Source: newatlas.com

Artificial Intelligence has inspired many Sci-fi Hollywood films. This time you can say that Anki (Robots and Artificial Intelligence Products manufacturing company) has been inspired by a fictional robot from the science fiction Star Wars. After Anki Drive and Cozmo, Anki has launched its new home robot named Vector which is quite similar to the fictional robot Droid in the movie Star Wars.

Vector is said to be as the elder sibling of Cozmo as it has got additional features. Like Cozmo, it is a tiny robot that can fit into your palm. Vector is like a home robot that will roam around and will give you the feel of a pet. This tiny robot is launched on 8 August 2018, on Kickstarter. It costs near $249 and will be available at a discount for the early buyers. The early-buyer campaign will start on 6 September and will last till 30 September. Vector is on the costly side as Cozmo priced $180, as it is smarter than Cosmo.

1) Look and Size: Vector is a small robot having a height of three inches and can easily fit into your palm. It has got an arm through which it can lift lightweight objects and can respond to your commands. It is so small that sometimes you can miss it on the floor, so it must be allowed to wander on the table or shelves to avoid any kind of damage.

2) No Device Connected: You just need to connect Vector with wifi and rest is on its own. It does not need any tethering device to control it. It is equipped with the 1.2GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and is fully autonomous.

3) Designed to Learn: Vector is self-sufficient as it is designed to learn. It is must be kept on all the time so that it walk around and examine things. It will go to the new things it sees, look at them, will try to push and will investigate to know more about them.

4) Functionality: This tiny robot uses its four microphones to figure out the commands, and responds in its robotic voice. With the help of its 120-degree HD camera, it captures the faces and can recognise them later. It can call your name and will respond to your hello. You can ask it about the weather or about some new and it will give you the right answers.

Vector is smarter, yet has got an emotional quotient, as it was designed in the way that people focus on its personality, more than its functionality. Vector can behave like your pet and will play around with you just like Coszmo does. It is respondent to its owner and whirls around when called by him. Also with its touch sensors, it recognises the touch of its owner. It can also make direct eye contact with its high-resolution IPS display that gives a lively feel to its activities. It has got tank-like tread to walk and is rounded out by a 6-Axis IMU.

All in all, Vector is a complete package of a home robot that will roam around and gives you the feel of a companion around you. The robot will be shipped in the October of this year to the backers and its official release date will be October 12, 2018.

Robot Tutor Musio is here replace your language teacher

start-up / By

Education & training industry is making use of technology in many ways. While many youngsters and teachers are acquainted with online learning and eLearning, the next revolution is coming in the form of robots. An adorable robot named Musio is here to help you with your language skills. After successfully completing its Crowdfunding campaign recently, it was launched officially at a price tag of JPY 98,000 in Japan last week. One can buy Muiso easily via Amazon Japan, Softbank’s marketplace and through some offline retail stores.

As of now Musio’s capabilities include small talks, answering simple logical questions, admitting it’s fault or lack of knowledge and most important one is correcting language flaws. It can detect and notify wrong pronunciations and wrong grammar usage etc. This robot’s face and heart is made of interactive touch screens meant to show a range of emotions to connect on a deeper level with users. Moreover, one can even read books, play games; developed by an educational publisher Gakken, and go through menu using these touchscreens.

But, what’s all this fuss about? It looks and functions like a high-tech talking doll with some grammar sense. No, comparing Musio to a toy is simply underrating its capabilities. Musio’s parent company is an AI venture, AKA Study. That said, Artificial Intelligence is going to play a major role in further development of this robot. Although API’s are available free of cost from major players in AI industry like Google, Baidu, Apple and Amazon for development purpose, but AKA decided to build its own proprietary engine specifically for Musio robot.  Now that brings ability to recognize a particular user, referring back to his older conversations to analyze his growth rate and potential.  Musio robot might be able to find out the weak areas while learning language together and then design further conversations to help in advancing altogether.

On asking Jung, co-founder AKA, why he considers Musio a robot as it does not have any moving parts, he said “We put a motor system in there. If you need a dynamic part, you can add it in the future,” the CEO explained. The brand is planning to add movable components to the robot afterwards as future updates increasing its functionality even further. One of his visions for Musio is of a “companion” that’s always there for elderly people to keep them connected socially with rest of the worldand helping them in living a healthy independent life. He said there is a huge demand for social robots in Japan justifying their focus on the market.

AKA study has already raised 10.7 million in seed and series A funding. That’s a lot of money going straight into development. Moreover, brands like Gakken, LG UPlus and Nexon, a gaming company, are backing AKA with Musio’s project. Just to inform you, the first batch of Musio robots is already sold out! You have to wait for the restock to get one in your hands.