Move over Apple Geniuses, there's a new tech savvy assistant at mobile phone stores in
Tokyo - one that's actually a bit of tech itself. This is Pepper, a prototype robot
being developed by Japanese mobile phone and internet company Softbank, and one it hopes
could be sold for personal use as soon as February 2015. Pepper is outfitted with 25
sensors to stop it from bumping into people and is capable of learning and expressing
emotions - as well as throwing shapes to a variety of J-Pop tracks by the looks of it.
The speed of calculation has increased dramatically with improvement in CPU technology. But as
technology improves and calculations get faster, we can take the first steps of using the computational
power to access emotions and feelings which are governed by the right-side of the brain.
To see how the public would react to Pepper, SoftBank took the robot to one of its Tokyo
stores, where it proved a big hit with the customers - although some remained wary.
It can entertain us and I feel this is just about right. If it gets any more advanced,
it might become scary.
The robot was developed by French company Aldebaran, but will be manufactured in Taiwan
and will go on sale for 198,000 yen which equates to roughly $1,900. Pepper units will
also share data via cloud computing and have a battery life of 12 hours before needing
to recharge - a process SoftBank say will take six hours.
Aside from entertaining shoppers SoftBank are hoping that Pepper could serve as baby-sitters,
nurses, emergency medical workers or even party companions - providing there are no
stairs at the party of course. The Japanese government is hoping that advances in robotics
could offset the decline in the labour force, as the country's population is one of the
most rapidly ageing in the world.