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A host of innovative robotic products were showcased at the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) earlier this year in Las Vegas. CES 2011 brought together over 140,000 industry professionals who were able to see the very latest technological products from the 2,700 companies exhibiting at the event. Among the most popular highlights from this year's event, were the new telepresence robot's by VGo, Anybots and iRobot. VGo gives you a virtual presence with the ability to move around freely in a distant location without actually being there. The experience is commonly described as having "your own avatar in a remote location." VGo's telepresence robot allows you to go beyond the boundaries of traditional video conferencing technology and actually be there in a physical sense! At a reported cost of around $6,000 it appears to be the most affordable solution on the market, although customers also have to take out an extra yearly service contract at $1,200. Silicon Valley start-up company Anybots, have just released their telepresence QB robot, featuring a webcam that shows the controller's face, meaning you can have a virtual presence even though you could be miles away. The QB robot, aimed at the business world, officially went on sale at the start of February this year, at a cost of $15,000. The QB is hailed as the first professional-quality telepresence robot to allow executives to work remotely through a simple interface. iRobot, best known as being the maker of the Roomba and Scooba lines of cleaning robots, have developed a working prototype that uses sensors similar to those used on Microsoft's Kinect, for seemless navigation. It moves using wheels and can be controlled using an iPad mounted on its adjustable head. AVA, short for "avatar," has two PrimeSense sensors as well as microphones, speakers, laser rangefinders, and bump sensors for obstacles which suit the robot's primary purpose: video telepresence. Although in a development phase, what industry experts are most excited about is the fact that iRobot AVA has an apps platform, allowing developers to incorporate new functionality into the interface. iRobot stress that this product is very much still a prototype and there's no word on a launch date or price just yet. So, the world of telepresence and video communications continues to develop at ground-breaking speed. No longer will CEO's have to make surprise visits to some of their under-performing locations. They can see, interact and find out what's going on without ever having to leave the office! It all sounds to good to be true and it's still too early to tell if telepresence robots will revolutionise the way we communicate and whether these companies can really create a market for the telepresence robot. Whether you're a skeptic or not, telepresence robots are here, and the presence of VGo, Anybots and iRobot at CES 2011 signals the start of the next generation of telepresence solutions, where our avatar robots will 'virtually' transport us all over the world! Read the recent development on Video Conferencing and telepresence.
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