Anki Cozmo Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET

Anki, a company that made a splash with AI-controlled Overdrive toy racing cars in 2015, now has a follow-up product called Cozmo. It’s a palm-size robot that will hit home with fans of the film Wall-E. And, much like Wall-E, Cozmo’s expressiveness could be the magic that makes it feel like part of the family.

Anki was known for the artificial intelligence that powered its smart (toy) cars, and now gives that AI a cuddly personality. Cozmo can recognize and remember your face and your name, making it feel almost like a pet dog. It can’t actually speak, but it can get the message across in different ways.

Screenshot by Jacob Krol/CNET

Cozmo has emotions: Happy, Sad, Mad, Angry, Glad, Annoyed and plenty of others. The brain inside of the robot processes interactions invoking these and the algorithms seem pretty responsive in the demo materials provided by Anki.

It “talks” with his own robot sounds, a bit like a droid from Star Wars, so it certainly won’t be quiet. It also moves around, with four wheels and treads, and bulldozer arms. This allows the bot to knock, push and stack “smart blocks,” three of which come with Cozmo in the box, and these will be used for different games.

Cozmo expresses emotions as you play, like a supersmart Furby. If you stack the blocks correctly, it’ll be happy. It’ll be be mad if you knock them over. According to Anki, there will be several games available right out of the box, and the robot will remember your favorites and ask to play those when its programming says it’s bored.

The face of Cozmo reminded me of an old CRT monitor, and it can change depending on what it observes. Not to lean too heavily on the Wall-E comparisons, but it has a glow similar to Eve’s from the animated film.

Anki

While I haven’t gotten to spend any hands-on time with it yet, it’s intriguing to think of an emotion-packed robot that will sell for under $200 in the US, and comes with its own smart blocks and games.

Cozmo will be landing this October and will retail for $180 (about £135 UK, or AU$245). That’s more expensive than robot toys like Sphero’s BB-8, but on paper Cozmo promises to do a lot more.