Pepper, a vision-guided humanoid robot developed by Aldebaran, which is part of the SoftBank Robotic Holdings Group, recently went on sale for the first time, selling out in ridiculously quick fashion.
Last month it was announced that Alibaba Group Holding Limited and Foxconn Technology Group each invested $118 million for a combined 40% share of the SoftBank Robotic Holdings Group, an entity which holds Aldebaran, Pepper and the Pepper SDK software group.
"Since foundation, we have followed our corporate philosophy of ‘Information Revolution — Happiness for everyone.’ I am very excited that we will partner with Alibaba and Foxconn, and challenge to go global with our robotics business, including Pepper, as a first step to realize our vision. To bring more smiles to people around the world, we will aim to be the No.1 robotics company," said Masayoshi Son, Chairman & CEO of SoftBank.
This investment was made in order to build a structure to bring Pepper and other robot businesses to global markets, with the aim of developing the robotics industry on a worldwide scale. A little over one month after that, 1,000 of the robots sold out in just one minute.
Pepper is a humanoid robot designed to live with humans and react with them on an emotional level in four languages: English, French, Japanese, and Spanish. Pepper, according to Aldebaran, will help people grow, enhance their life, facilitate relationships, and connect them with the outside world.
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