When you think of a pet, cute and cuddly are some things on top of your mind. Not sleek and shiny. But that’s exactly what Xiaomi created.
Cyberdog, a bio-inspired quadruped robot, was unveiled by the tech giant in early August 2021. It promises deep learning and a suite of abilities even real dogs can’t perform: doing backflips and front flips, creating navigational maps, and communicating with your smartphone.
“CyberDog is equipped with 11 high-precision sensors which provide instant feedback to guide its movements. This includes touch sensors, cameras, ultrasonic sensors, GPS modules, and more, giving the CyberDog enhanced capability to sense, analyze, and interact with its environment,” Xiaomi wrote in a statement.
But what’s scary about the Cyberdog is not its cold steel or headless design. It’s the open-source platform that allows users to co-develop it.
“Through open-source, Xiaomi encourages developers from around the world to contribute to this field, communicate with each other, and progress together,” says Xiaomi.
The robot quadruped comes with external interfaces that allow developers to integrate a wide range of add-ons or software systems, such as a searchlight, panoramic camera, motion camera, or LiDAR.
It is unclear how much freedom open-source developers have over the Cyberdog, but it remains to be seen whether this will be the prelude to robotic world domination.
Imagine a household that has IOTs: Theoretically, Cyberdog can be “trained” to operate your WiFi-connected appliances, such as your kettle, your television, and even your robot vacuum cleaner. It can learn to expect your arrival home and cool things up by switching on your air-conditioning system minutes before you arrive.
So far, only 1,000 Cyberdogs have been released by Xiaomi.
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