Mayfield Robotics, a Bosch start-up, is trying to make the home robot more personality-driven and lovable with the introduction of its Kuri robot today, a project that’s been in the works for nearly two years.
We’re all likely familiar with the home robots that hit the press circuit hard, like Pepper and Jibo. But we haven’t seen any of them break into mainstream use. At this point, the Amazon Echo and Google Home are our primary home robots. They play music on command, answer our bizarre questions, and turn our smart appliances on and off. Kuri differs from these prior robots because Mayfield stressed the importance of a personality during the design process, which comes through in Kuri’s expressive eyes and demeanor.
The voice-controlled robot is designed to do all sorts of things around the house, and unlike the Echo or Google Home, it’s on wheels. So yes, you can have a robot buddy follow you around while blasting Ludacris or whatever other music you like. At launch, however, the robot isn’t going to be natively compatible with any music streaming services, like Spotify or Apple Music, so instead, it’s going to act more like a Bluetooth speaker on wheels. Mayfield says it’s working on partnerships.
Kuri’s equipped with a laser array to help map a user’s house and has a 1080p camera behind its eyes for remote security check-ins, the feed of which can be accessed through its companion iOS / Android app. It controls smart home devices through IFTTT and knows to automatically return to its docking station when its battery is low.