The rise of Service Robots

Robotics have been of great use to humans since the Industrial Revolution, they have made manufacturing and processes way easier for us for hundreds of years. So, what exactly is a service robot and how does it differ from what we already know about robots? The international Federation of Robotics defines a service/smart robot as follows: A robot that performs useful tasks for humans or equipment excluding industrial automation applications. According to ISO 8373 these robots require “a degree of autonomy”, which is the “ability to perform intended tasks based on current state and sensing, without human intervention”.

This type of robotics is very recent and innovative, since a key element is needed to achieve that degree of autonomy that defines them and distinguishes them from traditional robotics. This key component is nothing less than artificial intelligence. We have all heard someone talk about artificial intelligence, it is a technology widely used in applications of all kinds. This is what allows Netflix and Spotify to make recommendations about what to watch or listen to, it is also found inside virtual assistants like Siri or Alexa to understand what we are trying to say. So, this means that the more advances there are in artificial intelligence, the more complex tasks service robots can carry out. As a matter of fact, Fortune stated that one of the main drivers for the Service Robots industry, is the popularity of artificial intelligence development and the great improvements on the field.

So now that we know what service robots are and how different they are from traditional robots, we can take a look at how are they helping humans.

The service robots applications, as we saw earlier, depends on the artificial intelligence capabilities they have. Among the service robots use cases, some of the most popular are security robots, waiter robots, scouting robots and lately, construction robots.

I hope you liked this brief introduction to the service robots industry, if you have any doubts or you just want to talk about the subject, don’t hesitate to reach me at elias.rivas@roomie-it.org.