Toyota Robots
Posted on July 4, 2006 Comments (18)
Toyota Announces Overview of “Toyota Partner Robot”
Toyota wants its partner robots to have human characteristics, such as being agile, warm and kind and also intelligent enough to skillfully operate a variety of devices in the areas of personal assistance, care for the elderly, manufacturing, and mobility. Furthermore, since each area requires a special set of skills, Toyota is promoting the development of three different types of partner robots (walking, rolling, and mountable), each with its own areas of expertise.
Read posts about the Toyota Productions System (TPS) on the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog.
Others are making progress on human like robots including Sony and Honda. See Sony QRIO Robots in action in this flash video below:
And read more about Honda Robots: ASIMO and P3.
18 Responses to “Toyota Robots”
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July 4th, 2006 @ 8:30 am
[…] Interesting. I still am surprised Toyota isn’t looking more into mass transit but they obviously know more than me. Toyota partner robots are a good strategic vision in my opinion. Toyota made just 4,600 homes last year, and is planning 5,000 homes this year. But it’s on a roll, recording 50 straight months of on-year sales growth. It’s targeting 7,000 homes per year by 2010. […]
July 4th, 2006 @ 11:07 am
[…] This is not hidden is some talk Deming gave once in New York City. This is in the first 10 pages of New Economics. I think maybe we overestimate how well we have accepted Deming’s teachings. We too quickly dismiss the work of everyone who has gone before, not just Deming but also: Ackoff, Box, Ohno, McGreggor, Kano, Scholtes, Joiner, Ishikawa and on and on. Yes, today incredible innovation is taking place at companies like Google but this is not new. Toyota has understood the importance of innovation (biotechnology – Hybrid cars 1993 – moving into car manufacturing – robots) for a long time (and so have many many more: IBM, Disney, Nike, NASA, DARPA, Apple, Microsoft, Wal Mart, Sony, Merck, Intel, Chalres Schwab, 3M, Amazon, Da Vinci, Miles Davis, Picasso, Edison, Fosbury, Einstein…). And given the date lets add the United States of America to the innovation list. […]
July 7th, 2006 @ 11:13 am
[…] Toyota: Way, Way Off-Road by Ian Rowley. Business Week has an article exploring the non-automotive Toyota, as we have mentioned previously: Toyota Robots – Toyota as Homebuilder – Toyota Engineers a New Plant: the Living Kind. Toyota controls dozens of businesses that have virtually nothing to do with automaking, ranging in size from resort developer Nagasaki Sunset Marina (77% owned by Toyota), with just five employees, to Toyota Financial Services Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary with 8,000 workers and $1.7 billion in operating profits in fiscal 2005. All told, revenues for Toyota’s nonauto businesses jumped 15.5%, to $10.3 billion, in the year through March, and are up 50% since 2003. While last year’s total still represented less than 6% of Toyota’s overall sales of $180 billion, if broken out the company’s sideline businesses would rank No. 192 among companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index. […]
July 17th, 2006 @ 1:19 pm
[…] Japan has also been investing heavily in such technology including robots. Japan’s population is more elderly and the needs and benefits to Japan have lead them to invest heavily in technology to assist an aging population. […]
August 22nd, 2006 @ 11:11 pm
[…] A visit to Toyota City: In Toyota land by Vinod Jacob: When I was a little boy it was fascinating to read about Toyota’s vision for non-polluting vehicles to replace existing versions. I used to marvel at the sketches of the futuristic small vehicles plying inside the Toyota campus. A visit to the Toyota headquarters proved this to be a reality. Just outside the Toyota technical centre are the E-com vehicles put on a charger. … Visitors are welcomed by robots playing the clarinet. … The `Toyota way’ is explained through audio-video shows that cover concepts such as JIT (just-in-time manufacturing system), Kanban cards, andon cords, synchronising dolly for instruments, and raku-raku flexible seats. […]
August 30th, 2006 @ 2:43 pm
[…] Related: Toyota Robots – Domestic robot to debut in Japan, BBC News – Tour the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Lab – Robot Learning – posts on robotics by curiouscat Tags: Students, Products, Robots Permalink to: Wakamaru Robot […]
September 5th, 2006 @ 7:42 pm
[…] Related posts: Toyota IT for Kaizen – Planet Kaizen – Toyota Robots – management blog posts on information technology While no exact figures are available, Toyota says Dealer Daily saves the company and its dealers tens of millions of dollars. Toyota also surveyed 3,000 of its dealership employees and found that the average person who had been using the text-based system saved 1.8 hours per day by using Dealer Daily. […]
October 15th, 2006 @ 6:41 pm
Teachers view a detective robot during the Robot Teaching and Research Seminar of Chinese Colleges and Universities in Beijing, China….
February 21st, 2007 @ 7:25 pm
Looks like they’re having trouble getting them to walk without really compensating on bending the legs. The arm movements are amazing though!
July 4th, 2007 @ 11:17 pm
Hello,
We are brownsugar productions inc., an audio-video production house in the Philippines. We are currently looking for stock footage of robots that can play music, to be featured in an educational science exhibit at a shopping mall here in Manila. The robots that have captured our interest so far are the guitar-playing Mechabonham and the Toyota robot trumpeteer. Would you have any information on how we can acquire video footage of these robots in action? We would would greatly appreciate any help you can give us.
Sincerely,
Martin Rey Aviles
Brownsugar Productions, Inc.
July 25th, 2007 @ 11:06 am
“Robots from Science – These are real robots that have served useful or potentially useful functions and demonstrated unique skills in accomplishing the purpose for which they were created. These may also be robots created primarily to entertain, as long as they function autonomously…”
December 6th, 2007 @ 1:50 pm
“Toyota President Katsuaki Watanabe said robotics will be a core business for the company in coming years. He says Toyota will test out its robots at hospitals, Toyota-related facilities and other places starting next year. He hopes to see partner robots in use by 2010…”
January 27th, 2008 @ 5:02 pm
[…] Whenever Robovie spotted people who looked disoriented, the child-sized droid wheeled up to them and asked, “Are you lost?” If so, the robot provided simple directions to the destination and pointed the way. […]
February 15th, 2009 @ 10:08 pm
“Each algorithm is stored in a different block in a state transition diagram. With such diagrams, developers can easily comprehend the flow of the control and review the design even if they do not understand each algorithm…”
June 24th, 2009 @ 10:36 am
Looks like they’re having trouble getting them to walk without really compensating on bending the legs. The arm movements are amazing though!
August 27th, 2009 @ 5:22 pm
Holy Moly those are some cool robots! I think its really cool that Toyota is making partner bots for the disabled. This is huge! Whats next in the techno realm?
June 2nd, 2011 @ 6:57 am
Even though QRIOs are no longer under production by Sony, at least Toyota Robots still make their advance in technology. They are smart robots. I’m sure they’ll be of great help in the very near future.
September 25th, 2012 @ 7:36 pm
[…] Toyota Partner Robots – Toyota Develops Thought-controlled Wheelchair – Honda’s Robolegs Help People Walk […]