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The Barcelona Mobile Show is full of new gadgets and advanced innovations in the world of technology and communications, from eternal cloning to a connected external skeleton, and Agence France-Presse presents five of the most prominent of these technologies.
Flying taxi
The giant Korean telecoms company, SK Telecom, in cooperation with the California startup Joby Aviation, has created a flying taxi, which, according to its designers, will allow “shortening the time it takes to travel” in crowded cities and roads. By avoiding traffic jams.
This air taxi has some of the characteristics of a helicopter, and another aspect that is similar to drones. This device includes six electric motors, which enables it to take off and land vertically. The flying taxi can carry up to four people in addition to the pilot, and has a top speed of 320 kilometers per hour.
SK Telecom, which allows visitors to the exhibition with a connected helmet to simulate a virtual flight over Seoul in a prototype urban air mobility vehicle, stated that this service may be launched as early as 2025 in South Korea, where experiments have begun.
Eternal reproduction
The Japanese company Alt Inc. is offering anyone a chance to win eternal life, but virtually, with a digital version of themselves centered around its PAI (Personal Artificial Intelligence) project, a virtual cloning that enables them to “record their lives” and “transmit them to their family and descendants.” “.
The creation of this digital copy of a person requires three types of information, the first of which is his image through photos and videos, the second is his voice through audio recordings, and finally his personal tastes and preferences, which the program obtains via the Internet. This allows the copy to “think” in the same way as the real person who is copied from, according to the owners of this innovation.
“Your grandchildren (thanks to this digital version) can continue to talk and interact with you, even after your death,” said commercial director of Alt Inc. Memory Yamato, stressing that information about the user is encrypted and therefore protected.
Connected external skeleton
The Catalan company, which has been conducting tests for the external skeleton for years, “Able human motion”, intends to launch it next June in the European market, and it enables people with a spinal cord injury to stand up from their wheelchairs and walk again.
This device, which is placed on the patient’s legs, is made of carbon fiber, which limits its weight to 10 kilograms. The device uses sensors to determine which movements the patient is willing to make, similar to the inertial units used in navigation.
The designers of this device explain that it is possible to adapt gait parameters – such as step size – according to individual needs, thanks to a “mobile application”. In the long term, the device can also be used by people with Parkinson’s disease.
Anti loneliness robot
The mission of the humanoid robot, NHOA, which stands for never home alone, is to “alleviate the loneliness of elderly people who live at home.” According to the Catalan technology center Eurecat, which created it with a consortium of companies.
This orange and white robot, which is 1.60 meters long, can be controlled via a touch screen, while using voice to request certain tasks from it. It is able to interact in a “socially intelligent” way and “build an emotional relationship” with its user, according to Eurocat.
David Marie, director of the eHealth unit at this private think tank, said the goal was not to replace human relationships but to “humanise” the connected apps and things used by seniors living alone at home.
Lost dog finder
How do you find your pet if it ran away from home? Petnow provides an alternative to microchips and collars, and allows people to identify their dogs and, if necessary, their whereabouts by swabbing their noses.
Each dog has its own “nose print” “like a human’s”, and is therefore “a reliable way to distinguish dogs from each other,” as explained by the Korean start-up company, Petnow Inc., which invented this tool.
Pet Now Inc., which is also developing a similar tool for cats but based on facial recognition, explained that the owners of the animal had only to declare it missing online, hoping that anyone who finds it would notify them.
