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Sony to set up intelligent robot lab: report
TOKYO (AFP) Mar 14, 2004
Japanese consumer electronics giant Sony will set up a laboratory to develop intelligent robots, adding to its line of pet and humanoid machines, a press report said Sunday.

The wholly owned laboratory will be established in May or June by recruiting 10 to 20 leading researchers in robotics and brain science from universities and research institutes in Japan, the Asahi Shimbun daily said.

No official was immediately available at the head office of Sony Corp. to confirm the report.

"I hope to bring into existence in five years' time a robot which can communicate so naturally that it is indistinguishable from man," the daily quoted senior Sony executive Toshitada Doi as saying.

Doi has led Sony's development of robots starting with its popular robot entertainment dog AIBO.

Last December Sony unveiled the world's first "running" robot, QRIO, which can jog at a speed of 14 meters (46 feet) a minute. Weighing seven kilograms (15 pounds), silver metallic QRIO is 58 centimeters (23 inches) tall, with beaming blue lights for eyes.

The projected laboratory will study the latest theories of brain science and wide-ranging research on how the brain behaves in health and illness, and apply them to robot development, the report said.

It hopes to create a robot which can make voluntary and intelligent movements by learning things by itself or reacting to changes in its surroundings, the report said.

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