Out of all the things that Asus could announce at their press event in COMPUTEX, probably no one was expecting the company to reveal a robot. Well, they did, as Asus revealed a robotic personal assistant that goes by the name of Zenbo.
As a robotic personal assistant, think of Zenbo as Asus’s own version of Siri/Cortana, but in the form of a robot. Much like those other personal assistants, Zenbo is able to look up recipes, set up reminders, do some online shopping, and even contact your family when an emergency happens. Asus has also programmed the robot with emotions, making Zenbo quite possibly the cutest digital personal assistant available today.
Perhaps the most interesting thing about Zenbo is that it is capable of connecting to your smart home devices, thereby making it work like a hub of sorts. With that capability, you can order Zenbo to turn on the lights or look through your house’s security cameras.
Zenbo isn’t just strictly a utility-device though as Asus claims that the robot is capable of providing entertainment as well. One of the entertainment feature is that Zenbo is able to tell stories from its built-in library.
Of course, Asus did note that Zenbo is currently in its infancy, but the company plans to introduce features such as spoken reminders. Asus will also be launching a Zenbo developer program, giving those interested access to the robot’s SDK. Whatever the case, Zenbo is quite possibly the most interesting thing that Asus has up its sleeves so far, and we can’t wait to see what this little thing is capable of.
The Zenbo will have a retail price of USD 599 (RM 2,466).
