'Astro' is Amazon's New Wall-E Inspired Home Robot

At a ceremony last night, Amazon debuted its first house robot, Astro. The robot is "intended to assist clients with a variety of duties such as home monitoring and keeping in touch with family," according to the business. Astro is touted as the next-generation virtual assistant that can wander about you and aid with daily tasks, thanks to a combination of artificial intelligence, computer vision, sensor technologies, voice and edge computing. Here are some of the things the house robot can accomplish.

Astro may resemble Pixar's Wall-E in terms of design, but without the cleaning skills. Indeed, the promotional film promises a sound that is eerily similar to that of the Disney character, at least when walking (or sliding), which many fans recall from Star Wars' BB-8. In terms of use cases, Amazon says Astro is compatible with the company's smart-security product, "Ring." Users may configure Astro to roam your home autonomously and even save footage to Ring cloud storage with Ring Protect Pro, a new subscription service from Ring. Users will be able to access footage through the Ring or Astro apps at any time.

Astro's fluid-dynamic movement, which distinguishes it from rigid robots like Star Wars' C-3PO, is what makes it more striking, at least in promotional materials. The screen can smoothly tilt up and down, simulating the movements of a real person's neck. Astro has a new computer vision capability called visual ID, which allows family members to teach the robot to recognise their schedule, according to Amazon. Astro might send a reminder or make a phone call to a specific person, or even find someone to carry them something from the "Astro's cargo bin."

All of the latest machine learning and AI technologies, however, present a slew of privacy concerns, which Amazon seeks to address. In a blog post, Amazon emphasises that its house robot, like other Echo products, has a separate microphone/camera-off switch. When Astro is enabled, it can't move or record video or audio, and a dedicated red LED illuminates to match the screen's red status indicator. It also has a "easy-to-see LED light on top of its periscope to let you know when it is streaming video or audio to the cloud," according to the manufacturer. When a video is sent to the cloud, such as when live view is active, the indicator light on top of Astro's periscope will turn green.Amazon asserts in a separate FAQ that the sensor data used by Astro to navigate your home is analysed on-device rather than always being transferred to the cloud. When consumers utilise services like live view in the Astro app, video calling with Alexa Communications, or video recording and storage by Ring, it only sends video or images to the cloud.

Amazon is clearly promoting ‘Astro' as a next-generation virtual assistant, now realised in a physical body, rather than an enhanced Alexa-enabled robot. The nomenclature is also extremely apparent, as it is just called Astro rather than Echo Astro. Furthermore, it has its own wake word, "Astro."

Coming to the pricing, Astro will cost $1,449.99 (about Rs 1,07,500), but as part of the Day 1 Edition programme, it will be available for $999.99 (around Rs 74,200) with a six-month trial of the Ring Protect Pro subscription included. Astro will be accessible in limited quantities, with the business planning to begin sending out invitations and delivering devices to clients in the United States later this year. Astro's arrival in India could take several years.