Robot-waiters remotely controlled by differently abled people serve at a cafe in Japan
Nov 27, 2018 16:18 PM IST
It’s no secret that humans have been obsessed with the concept of robots serving them.
Now a cafe called Dawn ver.β (Beta) which has a robot as waiters has opened in Tokyo’s Minato Ward. These robots are remotely controlled by people who aren’t physically able.
The pilot run of the cafe started today and will be open till 7 December.
Robots as waiters.
Robots have occupied space in the reel life as things that are superior to humans, but in the real world, robots seem to have been made to blend in and help out humans.
This new cafe comprises five OriHime-D robots who are 1.2 metres tall and weigh about 20 kg. They are designed to send video and audio via the internet which will allow the ones operating them to direct the waiter-robots.
The humans operating the robots may have conditions such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis which is a form of motor neuron disease as mentioned in Japan Today. The controllers of these waiter-robots can work from home on their tablets or computers.
The developer of these robots, Kentaro Yoshifuji, chief executive officer of Ory Lab said that he wants to “create a world in which people who can’t move their bodies can work too,” as per the report in SCMP.
There will be ten people who will be working as per their shifts for 1,000 yen per hour.
As cited by Engadget, at a demonstration held in August which showed how the system would work, a robot waiter was controlled by Nozomi Murata, who suffers from autophagic vacuolar myopathy that causes atrophy of skeletal muscles.
Ory Lab along with Nippon Foundation and ANA Holdings Inc aims to launch a permanent cafe by the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics.
Ory Laboratory has also produced smaller OriHime robots that are 21.5 cm tall and weigh about 600 grams which have been introduced by about 70 companies for telecommuting. They are also said to be used remotely in classrooms by students who cannot attend school due to illness or other reasons.