The Chinese electric car startup Xpeng is targeting a younger population group with its latest invention: a robot unicorn that children can actually drive with.
The “Little White Dragon” will be equipped with an artificial intelligence that will enable it to maneuver autonomously, to navigate through different terrains, to recognize people and objects and to provide an “intelligent emotional interaction” The South China Morning Mail.
Like a real unicorn, this four-legged wonder doesn’t seem to exist – at least not yet.
Xpeng released a computer-animated video on Tuesday showing the little white dragon playing with a little boy.
The company’s robotics division hopes the creature will become the first intelligent vehicle for children and will launch “a robotic ecosystem” based on the company’s smart car business, according to SCMP.
Future products could do the housework and interact with human users “on an emotional level,” the paper reported.
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“Little White Dragon” is equipped with an AI that enables it to maneuver autonomously, to navigate through different terrains, to recognize people and objects and to enable an “intelligent emotional interaction”.
“Building on our capabilities in autonomous driving, speech recognition and intelligent manufacturing, Xpeng will move into the field of robotics by making the most of the technologies we understand,” wrote Xpeng chairman He Xiaopeng, a former Alibaba executive , on the Chinese microblogging site Weibo.
“Our first goal is to produce a slow, rideable robotic pony for transportation purposes.”
The Guangzhou-based company did not disclose any information about the cost of the little white kite or when the robotic pony would be made or mass-produced.
Xpeng did not immediately respond to a request for comment from DailyMail.com
Xpeng is marketing the robot unicorn as the first intelligent vehicle for children and hopes it will launch a “robot ecosystem” based on the company’s smart car business
Xpeng posted a video on Tuesday showing the little white dragon playing with a little boy
He previously told the Post that he grew up watching Transformers cartoons and was inspired by the idea of ”fusing technology with mobility.”
Xpeng’s robotics division was founded in late 2020 with an estimated $ 1.55 million in registered capital, the newspaper said.
While He is determined to get into the household robotics market, electric cars are still Xpeng’s bread and butter.
Xpeng Motors raised a total of $ 4.6 billion in funding and started exporting its flagship P7 sedan internationally this year, according to Crunchbase.
Xpeng’s main business is cars: this year the company began exporting its flagship P7 sedan (pictured). As of January, the company had raised a total of $ 4.6 billion in funding
Boston Dynamics’ commercial has become the standard for AI animals, but at $ 74,500 it’s aimed more at the military, police, and search and rescue teams than toddlers.
Little White Dragon, however, has some competition in the robotic animals division.
In August, another Chinese tech company, Xiaomi, debuted CyberDog, a robotic puppy dog that sells for just $ 1,540.
Using both remote control and voice control, CyberDog can follow its owner, navigate around obstacles and perform other tricks, including begging and shaking paws
CyberDog can beg, shake a paw, and do backflips, and it can reach a top speed of over 11 km / h.
In addition, it is based on open source code that developers can use to create their own upgrades.
