Aldebaran Or How To Sell A Robot

Developing and selling a social robot is challenging and many companies have failed.

The business of creating and selling social robots is risky. Many companies have tried to sell social robots and only few have succeeded to sustain their business over a longer period of time. Aldebaran, or Softbank Robotics, as it is known today, is one of the biggest companies selling social robots to human-robot interaction researchers. Their Nao and Pepper robots are being widely used in the research community. I had the chance to talk with Amit Kumar Pandey, the head principal scientist at Softbank Robotics and Franziska Kirstein from Blue Ocean Robotics about how they develop robots.

ISSN 2703-4054

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Author: bartneck

Dr. Christoph Bartneck is an associate professor and director of postgraduate studies at the HIT Lab NZ of the University of Canterbury. He has a background in Industrial Design and Human-Computer Interaction, and his projects and studies have been published in leading journals, newspapers, and conferences. His interests lie in the fields of Human-Computer Interaction, Science and Technology Studies, and Visual Design.