Toyota intends to develop a full line of personal assistant robots

In a few years, personal assistant robots will be able to fetch items (and remember where you put them), guard your house, clean up the clutter in your home, engage in basic conversations, play music, and -- someday -- do your laundry. These are the kinds of things that really matter in terms of quality of life. Who wouldn't want a live-in helper who could handle basic chores? Humanoid robots from Toyota offer precisely that promise.

Yes, it's all many years away, but today we finally have working robots like Roomba and Aibo. There are more than 150,000 Aibo robots in homes around the world right now, and Sony is just getting started. When you consider the combined efforts of Toyota, Sony and Honda, it's exciting to realize that helpful household robots are truly on the way.

I predict the humanoid robotics industry will someday dwarf the automobile industry and the software industry. This will be the largest single industry on the planet, with hundreds of billions of dollars to be made by the right companies. Too bad the U.S. government can't see this coming and try to support our own fledgling robotics research. Today, the U.S. is at least a decade behind Japan, and I don't see any changes coming. Kudos to Japan for investing in technology that really means something.

• Toyota, the world's second largest automotive manufacturer, has made a clear statement of its intention to participate in the personal robotics market by announcing an internal project to develop partner robots designed to function as personal assistants for humans.
• This year has seen a flurry of activity in the personal robotics area and the heightened activity has encouraged a number of companies such as Toyota, which has been known to be developing robots for some time, to play its hand.
• Toyota does not see itself solely as an automotive manufacturer, and sees itself as a manufacturer of products which contribute to society.
• At the same time, people around the globe are starting to crave better, more diversified lifestyles.
• These changes are particularly prominent in Japan where dwindling birth rates and a rapidly aging population are underscoring concerns regarding the need to secure a stable labour force for the future in order for its people to be able to enjoy comfortable standards of living.
• Focusing on these issues, Toyota is promoting the development of human-assisting partner robots using the collective experience cultivated by the Toyota Group in automotive development and production engineering.
• Toyota wants its partner robots to have human characteristics, such as being agile, warm and kind and also intelligent enough to skillfully operate a variety of devices in the areas of personal assistance, care for the elderly, manufacturing, and mobility.