While the idea of having robots handle mundane tasks may seem like science fiction to many, certain countries are taking the technology very seriously.
PARIS: Imagine having someone to serve you a glass of water when you want! A French startup, Gostai, is doing just that. The year-old company claims to have developed easy-to-use robot software.
Company officials say that global market for robots is seeing a boom. “We want to do the same thing Microsoft did with its Windows software for personal computing,” said Jean-Christophe Baillie, founder of Gostai.
While the idea of having robots handle mundane tasks may seem like science fiction to many, certain countries are taking the technology very seriously.
That’s the case in Japan, where the aging of the population has become a concern. South Korea has announced its intention to have robots in households in 2010.
As a way of creating buzz, Gostai has offered free, downloadable versions of its software, called Urbi, which allows robots from Danish toy giant Lego to be programmed. It has also sold the software to 25 universities worldwide for use in robotics research.
“At specialised trade shows, you have 12-year-old kids who, after 10 minutes, tell us, ‘Get out the way,’ and start programming,” said Baillie.
Baillie recently demonstrated the software with a Sony robot dog. Explaining the simplicity, Baillie
said the code to follow a bouncing ball is only three lines long.
It all sounds intriguing, but big giants like Microsoft are already in the competition. Gostai accepts Microsoft as its main competitor, but the startup with eight employees, says it has a strategy.
It has worked to make the software as simple as possible, which it says gives it an advantage over the Microsoft version. Gostai also says that product’s versatility is another booster.
As Microsoft’s software is intended to be used only with Windows.
The next challenge for the company is funds. “We have to grow quickly because we have large ambitions — to have Urbi in all robots,” said young entrepreneur. “When a platform emerges, people are going to begin developing applications and the phenomenon will take care of itself,” he believes.
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