So you wanted a future with robots, did you? Xiaomi, apparently, is about to make that happen. CyberOne is its first humanoid robot, revealed during an event yesterday. It joins the company’s existing Cyberdog, a surprisingly affordable robotic quadruped. If there’s no option to have the pair interact, Xiaomi will have failed.
Unlike Tesla’s own humanoid droid, Xiaomi’s robotic person actually walked out on stage yesterday. It might not look as slickly human as Elon Musk’s concept but it’s apparently completely functional. The CyberOne robot joined Xiaomi’s CEO Lei Jun on stage, gave him a flower, and then posed for a selfie. Then, the robot left the stage under its own power, completely failing to explode or stop working.
Make your robot a CyberOne
I was both nervous and thrilled to interact with him on stage. What did you think of his performance tonight? #CyberOne pic.twitter.com/Je1eXDYEGR
— leijun (@leijun) August 11, 2022
CyberOne’s performance was obviously heavily scripted and pre-programmed, but it’s still an impressive demonstration. The robot actually qualifies for the term. Humanoid in appearance, but with some odd bulges to accommodate working parts, the robot stands about 1.77 metres tall. It weighs 52 kg and is completely bipedal. CyberOne also has a nickname and a Zodiac sign, according to Xiaomi — that would be ‘Metal Bro’ and Leo, respectively.
Other capabilities include 21 degrees of movement and a response time of 0.5ms to achieve that movement. Its upper body limb actuators are powered by a new Xiaomi-developed motor that weighs 500 grams but delivers 30Nm of torque. Its hip joints can develop up to 300Nm of torque. It can, obviously, walk around. It’s also capable of carrying up to 1.5kg of weight in a single hand.
CyberOne features a face, made from an OLED display, can perceive 3D objects and ‘hear’ thanks to microphones, and responds to voice and gesture commands. According to Xiaomi, its ‘bot can recognise “…85 types of environmental sounds and 45 classifications of human emotion”. There’s a substantial amount of AI behind the scenes making all of this happen.
But despite being an interesting take on a home robot, you probably won’t own a CyberOne for a while. Current pricing sits somewhere between R1.4 million and R1.7 million per robot. With development ongoing, it’ll be a little while before bipedal bots enter the mainstream. At the moment, we don’t even know how long the battery lasts or how functional it’ll prove to be. Still, it’s kinda cool though.
