It seems our future has just gotten a little farther away.

A recent New York Times article describes how Japanese robots are weathering the current economic downturn, and the news isn’t good. Yaskawa, Japan’s largest manufacturer of robots, reported a two-thirds drop in profit for the year ending March 20; and according to the Japan Robot Association, shipments of industrial robots fell by 59% in the first quarter of ’09.

This is a big deal for a nation where 32 out of every 1,000 manufacturing employees are robots.

So what does this mean for the likes of Tmsuk's Roborior? A home guarding robot meant to be more of an alert mechanism than a deterrent, its $2,600 price tag has meant the end of its production in a sour economy.  See a video of it in action here.

And what about the HRP-4C, a humanoid robot built by the Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology? A five-foot “female” capable of awkward movement and unconvincing facial expressions (see it here), its $200,000 price tag may overshadow its open-sourced code that allows people to program fun moves for the robot to perform.

So we may have to wait a while longer before we’re living in a post-post-modern floating Jetsons house. But fear not! You can still have your ramen prepared for you by a robot chef. So much for finding hair in your food.

--Brandon

Photo taken from this photostream and used with permission of a Creative Commons license.

Leave a Comment

2 Comments