Japan is the home to many robotic developments, whether its cuddly assistant robots or miniature banking robots. But now Japan has taken yet another step in the development of mechanical humanoids with its release of a human-looking android that could pass as a normal woman you'd walk by on an average day.
Last week, a young woman named Yangyang walked onto the stage of the Global Mobile Internet Conference in Beijing to the praise of thousands. Except she's not a woman; she's an android made by Japanese roboticist Hiroshi Ishiguro that is supposed to look like one of his assistants.
Ishiguro has been experimenting with android-esque robots for a long time. Ishiguro's androids have a long history of looking a lot like humans and even being able to pass themselves off as one.
Ishiguro told Vice that "Yangyang is a replica of researcher Yang Song, the wife of the president of tech company Shanghai Shenqing Industry and professor of Sanlian College in China. Ishiguro collaborated with the company to make Yangyang as a present for the company's research and development department.
Yangyang may look impressive, but she doesn't have a lot of functions. So far, she can blink, shake hands, and fidget like a human. While that may not seem like much, that was enough to capture the Chinese audience's heart. Ishiguro told Vice that"Everyone said that our presentation was the best,"
But what is Yangyang's future? Ishiguro believes she might find a place in the Chinese tech market, which isn't as regulated or skeptical as the Japanese and US markets. "The Chinese market is more active than the United States and Japan. They're eager to accept new technology,"
Ishiguro also received a $16 million grant from Japan's Exploratory Research for Advanced Technology program which will let him take Yangyang and his other androids to the next level.
