In a sea of demonstrations featuring the latest technology, one robot with quick reflexes seemed to stand out Tuesday afternoon as CES 2020 attendees gathered to take pictures and video.
The attraction was a back-and-forth game of table tennis between a fairly skilled human table tennis player and a robot, Forpheus.
While it appeared that the man versus machine match might have been a battle along the lines of a chess showdown between Garry Kasparov and a supercomputer, the robot was created to tutor its human counterpart.
This year’s CES, which kicked off Tuesday mostly at the Las Vegas Convention Center, marked the third year Japan-based Omron has brought its table tennis-playing robot.
This year’s version is more involved than past Forpheus generations, with the capability to read the emotions of his human rival. It’s just one of a long list of products at CES this year that show off artificial intelligence capabilities.
“It’s looking at player movement, body language and human emotion,” said Mike Chen, an engineer with Omron. “If the person playing is not smiling and appears to not be having fun, Forpheus can detect that and then increase the number of rallies.”
The real purpose of such machine-learning technology is about a person’s needs, Chen said. That information could then be taken to pinpoint how to help improve lives, especially in the field of digital medicine.
Omron’s health care division recently brought to market a wearable blood-pressure monitor called HeartGuide, which is worn like a watch. It retails for about $500.
“We want to demystify AI and robotics for people,” Chen said. “AI has a lot of different forms, but it all has to do with using algorithms to predict or analyze data to do or solve a task. Our vision is that AI can be used to improve human skill. Forpheus is a vision of how we think humans and machines can work together.”
Not far from the Omron setup in the Las Vegas Convention Center’s south hall on Tuesday was a booth for another overseas company busy showing off a robot. Standing at about 3 feet, Toki was displaying how it helps teach children language skills.
Made by Korean-based Hancom Robotics, Toki retails for $3,500 in Korea and is primarily used to help teach kids how to speak English.
“Through AI, Toki is able to recognize faces — it will recognize mom’s face or the child’s face and will change its mannerisms,” said Paul McManus, who works with Hancom through his company Advanced Robot Solutions. “Toki can dance or take pictures and can read stories. You can also do telepresence through it, so mom can call and say she’s going to be late coming home from work.”
McManus said the robot will likely be on the market in the U.S. later this year. Here, it might be used more in classroom or library environments, McManus said.
Along the massive CES exhibitor footprint, artificial intelligence was clearly one of the focal points for presenters on Tuesday.
“I think the (AI) game-changer is coming,” McManus said. “It’s in the background now. It’s in being conversational instead of just talking or recognizing commands. As humans, we’re using facial cues and all sorts of body language. Robots will get there, but it’s going to be a while. Robots don’t think on their own, so you have to hard-code everything.”
Scheduled to run through Friday, CES is expected to draw more than 170,000 visitors, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.
As of early Tuesday evening, Karen Chupka — an executive vice president with the Consumer Technology Association, the organization that puts on CES — said the first day seemed to have gone well.
“The first day is always a little hard because people are trying to get oriented, but I think things went smoothly for the most part today,” Chupka said. “It’s also always helpful when we have great weather because we use so many facilities across Las Vegas. The city has great transportation infrastructure, which is so important for a show of our size.”
The trade show, which has been here since 1978, is expected to have a $283 million impact on Southern Nevada’s economy.