Kuratas: Japanese robot, smartphone controlled
Sometimes it feels as though scientists and engineers have never watched the Terminator or Matrix movies at all. The Guardian reports that Japanese company Suidobashi Heavy Industry is showing off a new robot called “Kuratas” that weighs four tons, stands at 13 feet tall and comes armed with a gun capable of firing “6,000 ball-bearing pellets a minute.” The robot, unveiled this week at the Wonder festival in Tokyo, may sound scary but Suidobashi insists it “makes your dream of becoming a robot pilot comes [sic] true.”
Humans have two ways of piloting Kuratas, either by climbing into the robot itself or by controlling it remotely via a smartphone connected to a 3G network. Suidobashi warns users in its introductory video that Kuratas is “not a normal vehicle so it doesn’t guarantee you safety and comfort.” For anyone interested in buying one, the robot costs roughly $1.28 million.