Though it has been adapted to a number of inventive shapes and sizes ranging from three-wheeled patrollers to self-balancing two seaters, the Segway never quite found the commercial success envisaged when the first models appeared way back in 2002.
Intel, Segway and Xiaomi have teamed up to develop a hoverboard robot butler, complete with waving arms and facial expressions.
Intel CEO Brian Krzanich took the stage at CES 2016 Las Vegas to unveil the Segway hoverboard (with wheels, not an actual hoverboard), which can transform into a robot assistant.
You can see the robot in action in the video below.
The device is part of a new collaborative open robotics development platform powered by Intel's Atom and RealSense chips and cameras.
Besides recognizing people, it can also follow a person or do some simple fetching for you with the attachable robotic arms. The robot that can transform into a hoverboard or vice versa can process basic commands through voice recognition and can even stream videos. At CES, the robot actually answered the bell and escorted a guest into the room.
"What was most interesting was the ecosystem", said Patrick Moorhead, an analyst with Moor Insights & Strategy, who was in the keynote audience when the robot was demoed. The sky really seems to be the limit on the Segway personal transporter robot and it will be exciting to see what developers will dream up for the device. "To this point, no one has had an ecosystem like this". The merged company announced earlier this week that it would adopt the Segway name and make Ninebot a brand within the Segway umbrella. The release of robot's developer is expected in the second half of this year, it will allow inventors to develop new applications and uses for the robot.
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