Every one of us wonders why celebrities look so calm and composed on Airports and while all of us look exhausted with luggage. The answer to this question is that the celebrities have their personal assistant who manages and looks after their luggage.
When we make our way to the flight, we are all packed with the luggage and at the same time, we are also in a hurry to find out the gate. And in such circumstances, carrying a number of bags can be troublesome. But you can give your arms a break if KLM Royal Dutch Airways has its way.
Thanks to KLM Dutch Airline, now you can also have your own personal assistant of your own choice. The Dutch National Airline has introduced a new automatic trolley called E-Care and the bright blue-colored assistant has also been tested. According to reports, the trolley will be launched at San Francisco International (SFO) and New York’s JFK airports sometime in 2018.
As the E-Care is the product of Dutch Airline, you don’t need to speak Danish or English to operate it. According to the KLM officials, the robot uses a variety of non-verbal sounds to operate. To get started, the robot will first scan your boarding passes.
The KLM officials further said that after scanning the passes, the robot can carry a weight of 85 pounds and then walk with you at a speed of 3mph (which is the average walking speed of human). No wonder, KLM was able to build this machine with the help of AI as it can also use real-time data. The robot is so intelligent that it can sense if your gate changes and then redirects you accordingly.
This is not the first time that a robot machine has been introduced at airports to assist passengers. New York’s LaGuardia and Seoul’s Incheon are the other two robots that are used before at the airports.
Introduction of such an intelligent device gives an impression that KLM is an airline which is no stranger to technology. Prior to E- Care, the airline introduced an Android-based machine named Spencer and was launched at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport. But Spencer did not have the ability to carry your luggage.
Still, there are plenty of tasks which these robots can’t do like stopping a dude to level up the volume while others are listening to the boarding announcement and make you a cup of coffee. But the introduction of E-Care has given the green light to the upcoming machines which will be able to perform these tasks.
According to KLM officials, the airline is all set to try this robot for two-day trial this summer at SFO and JFK airports. The demo of this intelligent robot was planned to take place on 11 July in Brooklyn but it was then canceled 12-hours before the scheduled time. This cancellation has increased the skepticism in passengers to find out how the device will work.
The robot is so intelligent that it will stop at duty-free stores and if you are using a bathroom. Other than that, the device will also have a complete access to the GPS database of the whole flight. Care-E has a 4K LED display and rather than speaking to the customer, it will show facial emotions at the screen.
The luggage robot is full of technology as it has a LiDAR sensor which enables the device to avoid collision and obstacles. As KLM is well-known for the technology use, this device has 8 Ultrasonic Rangefinder, 3 on back and 5 on front.
To scan the boarding passes and body detection, An RGB-D Camera is embedded into it. Almost all of the tech parts are located on the front side. Testing of this robot will take in July at San Fransisco International Airport and in August at Kennedy International Airport, as reported by KLM officials. However, there are no chances to launch this robot worldwide as KLM only wants to see the interaction between this gadget and human.