Vector

A simple, compact, black wheeled robot smaller then the palm of a hand with two glowing green eyes sits next to a black cube with white simples on each end.
Vector wants to be your little helper. Photo: Anki

Vector is a little AI-powered robot that is packed with technology—and character. It's designed as a robot companion and helper for people at home.

Creator

Digital Dream Labs

(Vector was originally developed by Anki, which shut down in 2019.)

Year
2018
Country
United States 🇺🇸
Categories
Features
Meet Vector, Anki's latest robot. Video: Anki

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Appearance

Neutral

Did you know?

Vector loves fist bumps. If he asks you for one, don't leave him hanging!

A simple, compact, black wheeled robot smaller then the palm of a hand with two glowing green eyes sits on surface in a home.
Hey Vector, what's the weather in Seattle? Photo: Anki

History

Vector was developed by Anki, a San Francisco startup founded by Boris Sofman, Mark Palatucci, and Hanns Tappeiner, who met as students in the PhD program at Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute. The company's first products were the robot racing games Anki Drive and Anki Overdrive in 2013 and 2015, respectively. They were followed by Cozmo, a small programmable robot, and then Vector, a social AI-powered robot released in 2018. Anki raised a total of US $182.5 million from Andreessen Horowitz, JP Morgan, and other investors. In April 2019, after failing to secure a critical round of funding, Anki shut down. Later that year, Anki assets, including Overdrive, Cozmo, and Vector, were acquired by Digital Dream Labs, in Pittsburgh, Pa. The company now offers Vector 2.0, which received both hardware and software upgrades, on its website.

A woman holds a hand up to whisper to Vector, showing how small the little black wheeled robot with green eyes is, since it is smaller then her hand.
Tell me all your secrets. Photo: Anki

Specs

Overview

Able to answer questions using speech recognition and synthesis. Uses expressive LCD face to interact and engage users. Creates maps using single-point laser and navigates using SLAM. Convolutional neural network running on board for people detection and other tasks.

Status

Ongoing

Year

2018

Website
Width
6 cm
Height
7 cm
Length
10 cm
Weight
0.16 kg
Sensors

HD camera with 120 degree field of view, time-of-flight laser distance sensor, cliff sensors, capacitive touch sensors, four-microphone array.

Actuators

DC motors

Compute

1.2 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon

Software

Custom OS, SDK

Power

Lithium-ion battery

Cost
$250