Tokyo - Fans of Hello Kitty will get a chance to realise their dream of chatting with the hugely popular cartoon character later this year with the launch of a hi-tech robot of the feline.
The Hello Kitty Robo, equipped with a camera, speakers and sensors, will make its debut in Japan on November 1 to co-incide with the cat's 30th "birthday", a group of Japanese companies said on Monday.
The 52cm-high robot will be able to recognise 10 people, greeting them and having chats, using phrases such as "It's already lunch time. Have you eaten yet?", according to manufacturer Business Design Laboratory.
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Equipped with an ultra-sound sensor and camera, the mechanical Kitty can tell if anybody is approaching.
'It's already lunch time. Have you eaten yet?' It can call a playmate's name and start chatting by sorting 20 000 patterns of pre-registered conversations and picking phrases it feels are best suited to the occasion.
Hello Kitty was created by Tokyo firm Sanrio. According to Sanrio's "biography" of Kitty, the feline was born in London on November 1, 1974.
Hello Kitty products are sold in 60 nations and about 50 000 different types of Kitty character goods were sold worldwide during the previous fiscal year to March 2004 alone.
Business Design, based in Nagoya, developed the robot with NEC System Technologies, a software subsidiary of electronics giant NEC, and Futaba Industrial, affiliated with Toyota Motors.
Business Design hopes to sell 2 000 robot cats this year, priced at around ¥400 000 (about R24 000), by mainly targeting women in their 30s who are among the cat's biggest fans.
It hopes to export the feline robot in the future but no details have been decided yet, a company official said.
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