We are starting to see an influx of experienced people from the so-called
"IT industry" into the "robotics industry." The boundary between these
two industries is starting to collapse, and GetRobo feels that this
phenomenon will accelerate the commercialization of consumer robotic
products. One such figure is Tandy Trower, former General Manager at
Microsoft, who after 28 years at the behemoth, has left to form a
robotics startup called Hoaloha Robotics. He shares with us his vision
and an overview of the robot he is trying to develop.
(This interview was originally conducted for a robotics column on the
Wall Street Journal Japan.)
Q. According to your website, Hoaloha Robotics is developing
software and services to support new “socially assistive” robot
designs and that it will focus on "delivering pragmatic applications
that extend and augment human capabilities." Please give some
concrete examples on the kinds of tasks that you are aiming to
achieve using a robot.
A. First, let me say that delivering applications that provide value at an appropriate cost is definitely a core objective and one missing from being deliverable by most robots, outside of industrial, medical, search and rescue, surveillance, or military applications. That doesn't mean there aren't imaginative demonstrations that propose expectations like folding clothes, cooking foods, etc., but many of those demos are of expensive robots that most people would not be able to afford and they do not have any real user interface. It is even more obvious in the realm of "personal robots". In all my travels around the world, meeting some of the smartest people in robotics, I have found no one able to define a successful definition that combines the current technical capabilities, appropriate price, and user value beyond toys and gadgets.
But I digress, so back to your question. Hoaloha Robotics is targeting users that need assistance with daily activities as its initial starting point, so not the business user nor the general consumer. These latter markets will come, but it is much harder to create a value proposition at the present time for them. Meanwhile the worldwide population of people that require assistance with daily living activities is growing, fueled in large part by increasing life longevity and the aging of the baby boomer generation, while at the same time the human resources to help care for them is shrinking. So there is not only a business opportunity here, but a important social need that many already refer to as the Silver Tsunami.
With that context then, I can talk about applications areas that Hoaloha Robotics is focusing on as core to its solution. The first area is cognitive assistance. It is clear that as we age past our 50’s, our mental function - especially our memory - begins to decline. So a simple example of an application in supporting cognitive assistance would be a medication reminder. Most seniors commonly take an increasing requiem of medications. Helping them keep track of what to take and when to take them would be a valuable application.
Another application area is supporting physical assistance. Because we are designing for an autonomous - or semi-autonomous if you assume the robot is being directed by the user - mobile platform, it can serve as a simple transport for common items from food to items the user frequently may need to move with them, including the increasing number of biometric monitoring devices. And because the robot has a camera, actually multiple cameras and a display screen, the robot could be used as to magnify printed information or possibly even read that information to the user using OCR style technology.
Another important application area is supporting social/communications assistance. Humans are social beings and it is important to our health, regardless our age, to have regular communication with people around us and often as people age into their later years, their social network shrinks. Most of us already find social communication through a variety of forms (e.g. email, chat, texting) and it is important a part of our lives and not simply through our phones, but through our PCs and tablets.
And that brings me to the final area of the core application set. Because the robot is being built on top of PC technologies we have today, we should expect to see similar applications and services that are already available for PCs, such as information services like news, weathers, sport, financial info, and entertainment, such as games, music, videos, photos, etc.
Now some may say, why do we need a robot to deliver this when we could already deliver many of these applications on existing platforms today. To that I would respond that we already live in a world where we have technologies that overlap. I have a PC on my desk, carry a smartphone, and also travel with an iPad. Each form factor has its benefits and preferred usage scenarios, and the fact that I can do email, browse the web, check news and stock information on each does not invalidate any one of them.
But I would also add that the robot that we are defining offers a new form of interaction not found on the other platforms, one that enables the technology to be more interactive and proactive because it is self-mobile and because it is designed to be socially interactive. It is not just a stationary or passive platform that the user must go to or carry around to interact. In this way the robot offers the greater potential for interaction, more like a pet than an appliance.
One final point on the applications space here: I have tried to illustrate some of the types of applications we are developing, but it is also important to know that what we are developing is not simply to host our applications, but a platform that will allow for the integration of existing and new applications. Today as we see technologies moving into the assistive care space more and more, they each have their own interface and so require the user to be the integrator. However, our goal is to provide a common platform for integration of complementary technologies, and also provide a channel for third parties to bring their own ideas and creativity to this important market, a formula that Apple has so successfully done with the iPhone and iPad.
Q. Your website also states, "at the heart of the Hoaloha design is its human-centric user interface." Can you please elaborate on what kind of interface you are trying to develop?
