Engineers at Tokyo-based company Seven Dreamers started developing a laundry-folding robot called Laundroid in 2005, and now, there is finally a robot to show off at CES 2018. We haven't seen it in person yet, but we spoke with Seven Dreamers CEO Shin Sakane for a preview. The idea is: You drop clean, dry clothes into a box in a pretty home appliance, and then several hours later you can collect the folded, sorted items. Washing machines and dryers treat each item of clothing the same, but folding requires the appliance to identify garments and be able to physically fold them. Folding a towel is more complicated than it seems, and socks are currently impossible.
To tackle the tedious task of folding laundry, Laundroid consists of three technologies: Image analysis, artificial intelligence, and robotics. Even though there are multiple robot arms that fold the clothes, they are hidden inside a box that is styled like Italian luxury furniture, made of leather, wood, and glass. The materials are purposefully luxurious since the price point -- starting at $16,000 for the base model -- is much higher than most home appliances. It seems like someone who can afford an unnecessary $16,000 home appliance probably isn't doing their own laundry anyway, but Sakane says that nearly 500 people have already signed up to purchase a Laundroid. The price should drop significantly when the volume increases. Sakane tells us, "A lot of technologies are in our software, and software is expensive to develop but easy to apply for a mass production product."
Credits:
http://www.zdnet.com/article/laundroid-preview-robot-folds-sorts-clothes/
No comments:
Post a Comment