MIT professor and social robotics pioneer Cynthia Breazeal, has a long-term vision. One day we will have robots in our everyday lives. The path to this involves humanizing technology by taking them out of the lab and into the living room. Breazeal formed her own company, Jibo, which has developed an 11-inch tall robot who could easily make himself at home. Jibo swivels around on two axes, resembles a lamp, and with its Wi-Fi connection has the ability to automatically snap family photos, use voice commands, and read stories to children.

Jibo is up for preorder during its $100,000 crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo. He is a friendly, helpful, and smart little device; even being described as “the world's first family robot”. Jibo works with two high-resolution cameras, 360-degree microphones, and natural language processing. Jibo comes out of the box with educational, photography, entertainment, and communication applications. He can help mom and dad by snapping a family photo, playing voicemail or email, and flagging appointments. He can learn, help, see, hear, and relate to all family members by speaking in natural language, using voice and facial recognition, and understanding commands. With a kind voice and a spherical eye that takes the shape of a heart to show emotion, Jibo seems gentle to children.



Breazeal says “people want technology to treat them like a human being”, yet “right now, technology treats us like technology”. Jibo aims to change the dynamic between robot and human by being a transformative, social, and emotive robot. Although Jibo is fit to be rather stationary with no arms or legs, something about him seems so real. He is also inexpensive, starting at $499 for the Home Edition, and $599 for Pro SDK and members in the developer programs. The next goal is to integrate Jibo with third-party devices and hardware accessories so he could be the future interface of a fully connected home.