TOKYO, Japan — Japan's SoftBank has suspended
production of its humanoid robot Pepper, a company spokeswoman said Tuesday,
seven years after the conglomerate unveiled the signature chatty white android
to much fanfare.
اضافة اعلان
Pepper robots, used to greet people in stores and hotels in
Japan and around the world, have become a symbol of
SoftBank's strategy of
pouring resources into new technology including artificial intelligence.
The pint-sized robot, which costs 198,000 yen ($1,790) plus
rental fees, has also recently been used to ease the loneliness of coronavirus
quarantine in Japanese hotels for patients with mild symptoms.
But on Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the firm's robotics unit
told AFP it was halting output owing to an inventory pile-up.
"We are temporarily suspending production of Pepper but
are ready to restart anytime depending on inventory situations," she said.
"Pepper has chiefly been a rental service and you don't need a lot of new
units."
The company does not disclose the number of gadgets it has
sold or rented, the spokeswoman said.
When Pepper was released in 2014, it was billed as a
"new species" of
robot capable of recognizing basic emotions such as
happiness and sadness by looking at people's faces, while Softbank found
Masayoshi Son hailed it as a symbol of the firm's determination to lead in
artificial intelligence.
The company was in discussions on potential job reductions
with its European robotics unit, which is headquartered in Paris and employs
about 330 people, the spokeswoman said.
"We are negotiating about the cuts but it will take
time to reach a deal in France," she said, adding that the planned
reduction was "part of our regular efforts to optimize our
businesses" and was not directly linked to suspension of Pepper
production.
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