Imagine you’ve been on an 8-hour flight. Your cab waiting for you outside of the airport, and your luggage still on the conveyer belt. You are late for a client meeting. There are a lot of passengers circling the conveyer belt and all blocking the way in search of their luggage.
You thought, wouldn’t it be better if someone invented a suitcase that can to come to you? This way you don’t have to wait in line and therefore won’t have to be late at the client meeting.
Fret not, because you don’t have to wait for that anymore. The invention of robot travel buddies like a suitcase that follows you around already started.
Smart Suitcases
The invention of robot travel buddies started with smart suitcases.
Smart suitcases have a built-in GPS locator, USB ports to charge your mobile phones and solar-powered systems. With the solar-powered system, you can make sure they don’t run out of battery. It’s packed with a smart-lock system too keeping your valuables secure.
They invented smart luggage with flight cancellations and long queues at the airports in mind.
Travelmate Robotics
Travelmate Robotics pioneers smart suitcases that can move on its own. With this invention, it can make traveling a lot easier.
This suitcase has a Follow Me System. It tracks your location wherever you go. It finds you rather than you finding it along with other suitcases on the conveyer belt at the airport.
It also has Omni wheels which have an obstacle avoidance algorithm, which means it can avoid bumping into any objects. This kind of autonomous movement technology lets the suitcase navigates the environment seamlessly.
With this advanced technology, you can run through the airport gates without worrying about leaving your stuff.
Another useful feature is that it can travel around horizontally or vertically. You can put other stuff on top of the suitcase and it can still carry it around with you.
While it seemed to be very useful at airports, we can also use it in any situation such as going to school or going to work.
You can purchase Travelmate Robotics online. It comes in small, medium, and large sizes and priced between $1099 to $1495.
You can choose between black, pink, and blue colors. The suitcase has an innovative design almost as if it came out of a Star Trek movie.
The apps that control the suitcase are available both in the App Store and Google Play.
The company has also made the product available for resell for interested entrepreneurs that believe in the product.
ROBOHON
As expected, Japan is leading this technological advancement by inventing Robohon, a travel companion that you can rent as you arrive at the Haneda Airport at only $12 per day.
While a lot of digital devices can tell you about the weather, set an alarm for you, or answer the questions the internet can answer, travel companions like Robohon travels along with you wherever you go.
Robohon also has real-time information so it can inform you about a good ramen place when you are near the area, if there is a must-see art exhibit, or if a recent renovation is being held on the area.
Robots are now being incorporated into many aspects of the travel industry.
From booking our flights and hotels, robots like Snatchbot can assist us by asking smart questions and giving us a personalized promotion and travel advice.
There are already robot-staffed hotels in Nagasaki, Japan. Robots powered by AI technology and facial recognition populate the front desk. These robots answer any customer inquiry such as booking and baggage availability. Some concierge robots handle check-in and check-out.
There are also already travel assistant robots that look just like the regular staff. They make these robot assistants improve the customer experience from room services, hotel-related questions. They can even speak multiple languages for international guests!
We might think, Robots have already taken the place of humans rendering us obsolete in many industries. In reality, robots assist us in daily tasks. Think Knightscope robots that assist humans as security systems.
These robots can detect concealed weapons and other undetected objects at the boarding gates. These are tasks that a human cannot do but through the help of these robots, operations at the airport smoother.
There is so much to expect from this point forward.
We can hope for robot travel buddies not just to carry around our items but also to accompany us in navigating a new place. It can assist us 24/7 without needing breaks. It can do dangerous tasks that otherwise humans are required to do.
While it assists the travel agencies in giving us an enjoyable customer experience, we can also travel without worry as these robots assist us with useful information as we go along.
