Semi-humanoid centaur robot to work in hotels

The Chinese robotics company Pudu Robotics is making a virtue of necessity and developing a semi-humanoid, centaur-like service robot called FlashBot Arm, which consists of a humanoid upper body on a mobile base. This saves the company the expensive and difficult to control legs. In the future, the robot will work primarily in hotels, where it will serve guests in their rooms.

Pudu Robotics also has a humanoid robot with legs, the D9, in its range. However, the robotics company has deliberately dispensed with legs in the FlashBot Arm, as they make a robot considerably more expensive. They also have other disadvantages compared to wheeled robots, such as high-energy consumption. Coordinating the legs is also technically complex. However, this limits the mobility of the centaur robot, as it is less able to overcome obstacles and has to use an elevator instead of climbing stairs. However, this should not be a problem in hotels, the robot's intended main area of application.

The FlashBot Arm has a mobile platform. A humanoid upper body with two movable arms sits on it. The head is formed by a 10.1-inch touchscreen, on which a face is displayed as standard, allowing various facial expressions. Additional information can also be displayed on the screen if a guest requires visual information.

Movable hands

The arms are three-jointed and equipped with the DH11 robotic hands from Pudu Robotics, which have eleven degrees of freedom. The arms have a reach of 2 meters. This enables it to grasp and carry objects, operate buttons for elevators and lights and swipe and insert key cards to enter restricted areas. The robot can operate the elevators independently, recognize the floor numbers and travel to the corresponding floors. The robot thus compensates for the disadvantage of its lack of legs.

The FlashBot Arm uses a “Visual Simultaneous Localization and Mapping” system (VSLAM) for orientation. It has RGB depth cameras on board, panoramic cameras, a lidar module and various sensors. This enables it to create a 3D map of its surroundings in real time to detect obstacles and people walking around and avoid colliding with them. To deliver food and items to hotel guests, it has a compartment with a lid in its body to keep its hands free while on the move.

Communication in natural language

The FlashBot Arm can also communicate: it uses various artificial intelligence (AI) language models, a microphone and a loudspeaker. This should enable it to hold natural language conversations with guests and also accept delivery instructions. The robot should also be able to recognize gestures and gesticulate.

Pudu Robotics states that the robot weighs just 15 kg. According to the manufacturer, the internal battery lasts for around eight hours, provided the robot does not have to carry heavy loads. The battery should be recharged in four hours. FlashBot Arm automatically searches for a charging station.

Pudu Robotics does not provide any information on the price, but already lists the robot in the product selection on the company website. The company also does not mention when and in which markets the robot will be available. It will probably be some time before it rolls through hotels.

(olb)