I – Pad I – Robot
Telepresence has taken many forms over the years, Education, Health, Emergency services have all experimented with various iterations and combinations of form-factors and bandwidth. I have been involved in many promising, yet ultimately doomed trials and implementations.
The team at Double Robotics appear to have something genuinely innovative, well designed and most importantly, practical.
Combining the mobile utility of a “segway-style” device, plus the elegant form factor of an iPad and I sense they have a genuine candidate for the first publicly accessible and useable telepresence-device.It appears their price-point is somewhere between USD$ 1,999 and USD$ 2499.
The Double app uses a new high quality video service for iOS-to-iOS calls from OpenTok.
Certainly the culture of organisations and individual’s work-flows are by far the greatest challenges to remote collaborations, but this device appears to be a genuine contributor to improving the quality and “presence” of tele-presence in the general market place.
Worth a close look.
If you have not seen it yet, visit http://www.doublerobotics.com
Background:
Founded in 2011, Double Robotics is focused on building beautiful products with a rich user experience that is seldomly found in the field of robotics. Recently backed by the prestigious Y Combinator startup accelerator. The founders include David Cann, an experienced designer and iOS developer, and Marc DeVidts, an electrical/embedded systems engineer. Operated out of Sunnyvale, California, the company fabricates many of its robot components from its own CNC-equipped shop in Miami, Florida.
Links:
- Double Robotics
- OpenTok [TokBox]
- Y Combinator
- See Forbes article on Y Combinator
