Ugobe Unveils Pleo, Another Robot Dino
Posted on February 6th, 2006 in Latest News
As a followup to our previous story about Ugobe, it appears that they’ve just announced what their breakthrough product is – Pleo the robotic dinosaur. The official press release says, Pleo is modeled after a 1-week-old Camarasaurus sauropod, or long neck dinosaur, and incorporates basic traits of autonomous life. Pleo has been specifically engineered to mimic life with organic movement and behaviors that allow him to relate to humanity on a personal level.
Here’s also a story from PC Magazine about Pleo and Ugobe. For about $200 USD Pleo will supposedly have life-like motion accomplished via 14 motors and over 40 sensors. Pleo is also, " designed to create a roughly three-year relationship with the end users, where the robot will evolve overtime."
His sensors will include, IR communication and obstacle detection, light sensors, stereo hearing, foot and toe touch sensors, tilt sensor, and several body touch sensors.
The robot will have "organic movement" that attempts to replicate the way living organisms move and respond to changes in the outside world and within themselves. So, for example, a "tired" Pleo will move more slowly, while an awake one will move with a noticeable amount of energy.
Pleo is also claimed to be "self-aware" and able to communicate emotions through sound and movement. He’s also able to cough, sneeze, blink, chomp, twitch, sigh, and yawn. Many of these actions we have already seen before with the Furby, which one of Pleo’s chief designers, created. Pleo also has a SD card slot and recharable batteries.
If I had to guess, I’d say that Ugobe won’t be earning much off of these units. Perhaps it’s more of a PR move to get the market interested in their offerings, especially since they’re competing against the robot toy heavy-weight WowWee.
Regardless, it’s very cute and I’ll probably end up buying one.
[Via NXT Bot]
Tags: [ Robots | Ugobe | WowWee | Toys | Pleo ]
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June 9th, 2008 at 21:16
Very neat and a step in the right direction.
Regarding taking on WowWee, the estimated 3-to-4 hours of battery life suggests that Ugobe will be hard pressed to compete with the WowWee Robonetics family on power management. I hope that improves as the Pleo design progresses.
J Wolfgang Goerlich
June 9th, 2008 at 21:16
oh.. why is it so difficult for anyone from ugobe.com to show this “hot” product a video to the consumer like me.. I think it is just hype and completely waste of money like iCybie and Robosapien…
June 9th, 2008 at 21:16
Good point Ray. My guess is that there aren’t any videos. The Fall release time is still many months away, and it’s probably all prototypes at this point. :roll
June 9th, 2008 at 21:16
I suggest you monitor the DEMO site. Video could possibly be posted here: http://www.demo.com/demonstrators/demo2006/63039.html later in the week.
June 9th, 2008 at 21:16
I found some video of Pleo.
[URL=http://www.robotshop.com/gorobotics/The-News/Latest-News/Video-of-Ugobe%27s-Pleo-Dinosaur/]CNet vide of Pleo[/URL]
October 22nd, 2008 at 09:51
we have been selling these here in the UK, i must say the feed back from customers has been very positive and the word has certainly spread about this little pleo as regards to the numbers we have on pre order. its certainly going to be one of the top gifts this year for 2008. Everyone in my family now seems to want one…
if anyone would like any further info on the pleo dinosaur then please visit our uk website:
http://www.pleostore.co.uk
we will be very happy to answer any questions…..