{"id":12918,"date":"2016-10-03T10:42:25","date_gmt":"2016-10-03T10:42:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/?p=12918"},"modified":"2016-10-03T10:48:36","modified_gmt":"2016-10-03T10:48:36","slug":"toyota-to-sell-cuddly-companion-robot-in-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/technology\/innovation\/toyota-to-sell-cuddly-companion-robot-in-japan.html","title":{"rendered":"Toyota to Sell \u2018Cuddly Companion\u2019 Robot in Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 18pt;\"><strong><span style=\"font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Toyota to Sell \u2018Cuddly Companion\u2019 Robot in Japan<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\"><strong>Toyota to Sell \u2018Cuddly Companion\u2019 Robot in Japan<\/strong> : TOKYO\u2014 Toyota Motor Corp. plans to sell a pint-size robot in Japan called Kirobo Mini that is designed to provide companionship to people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">The robot goes on sale for \u00a539,800 yen ($392) this winter in Toyota dealerships in Tokyo and the area around the company\u2019s headquarters in Nagoya.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Kirobo, a combination of the Japanese word for hope and robot, can hold basic conversations while blinking its oversize eyes and wagging its limbs. It also comes with a cradle that fits in a car\u2019s cupholder, \u201chelping it fulfill its role as a cuddly companion always on hand for heart-touching communication,\u201d the company said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Japan has long had a love affair with robots. SoftBank Group Corp.\u2019s Pepper robot and Sharp Corp.\u2019s combination robot-smartphone are among the products that have gone on the domestic market recently, while Honda Motor Co. has a robot called Asimo that once kicked a soccer ball with President Barack Obama.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">In videos demonstrating Kirobo\u2019s potential, the tiny robot entertains children, chats over tea with an elderly lady and gives a pep talk to a fresh college grad as she heads to a job interview.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Toyota says the robot can identify human emotions. If you\u2019re feeling down, the robot will wobble about, look you in the eye and ask: \u201cWhy are you sad?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">\u201cAs you live together, you will come to love and be kind towards the Kirobo Mini, just as it does to you,\u201d says the video\u2019s narrator.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">The robot also has some automotive applications. If the driver brakes suddenly, the robot will yell: \u201cThat was scary!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\">Toyota said it hoped to use what it learns from Kirobo to make communication between humans and machines more like communication between people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 8pt; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;\"><strong>Source<\/strong> : http:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/toyota-to-sell-cuddly-companion-robot-in-japan-1475486949<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"fb-background-color\">\n\t\t\t  <div \n\t\t\t  \tclass = \"fb-comments\" \n\t\t\t  \tdata-href = \"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/technology\/innovation\/toyota-to-sell-cuddly-companion-robot-in-japan.html\"\n\t\t\t  \tdata-numposts = \"10\"\n\t\t\t  \tdata-lazy = \"true\"\n\t\t\t\tdata-colorscheme = \"light\"\n\t\t\t\tdata-order-by = \"social\"\n\t\t\t\tdata-mobile=true>\n\t\t\t  <\/div><\/div>\n\t\t  <style>\n\t\t    .fb-background-color {\n\t\t\t\tbackground: #ffffff !important;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t.fb_iframe_widget_fluid_desktop iframe {\n\t\t\t    width: 630px !important;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t  <\/style>\n\t\t  ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Toyota to Sell \u2018Cuddly Companion\u2019 Robot in Japan Toyota to Sell \u2018Cuddly Companion\u2019 Robot in Japan : TOKYO\u2014 Toyota Motor Corp. plans to sell a pint-size robot in Japan called Kirobo Mini that is designed to provide companionship to people. The robot goes on sale for \u00a539,800 yen ($392) this [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12920,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[975],"tags":[7920,7926,7927,7224,7921,7922,7928,7929,7924,7923,7925],"class_list":["post-12918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-innovation","tag-asimo","tag-automation","tag-corporate","tag-japan","tag-kirobo","tag-robot","tag-robotics","tag-sciences","tag-softbank-group","tag-toyota","tag-toyota-motor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}