The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2022 - Issue 31

A mazon has ventured into the world of AI with their first robot for the home. Astro is designed to help homeowners with tasks like home monitoring and keeping in touch with family, thanks to its built-in periscope camera. It brings new advancements in artificial intel- ligence, computer vision, sensor technology, and voice and edge computing in a package designed to be helpful and convenient. Astro can check in on your home while you’re away, bringing peace of mind that your home is safe. It moves autonomously around your home, navigating to check in on specific areas and showing you a live view of rooms through the Astro app. It even sends alerts if it detects an unrecognised person. It can check if you have left the stove on or need to confirm you have all the ingredients needed for dinner in the pantry while you're still at the store. With Alexa Guard, the robot can detect the sound of a smoke or carbon monoxide alarm, or glass breaking and will send an alert to your phone, even when you're somewhere else. Those remotely caring for elderly relatives or loved ones can ask Astro to set and deliver reminders through their loved ones or use the ‘Drop In’ function to stay connected. When used with Alexa Together, a new service designed to help family members feel more comfortable and confident living in- dependently, they can set up reminders and receive alerts to re- assure caregivers that their loved ones are active and going about their day. It also gives loved ones 24/7 hands-free access to Ur- gent Response, a professional emergency helpline. Another function is Ring, which through their Ring Protect Pro subscription service, allows users to set Astro to autonomously patrol your home while they’re out and proactively investigate when an event is detected. It will automatically save video clips to the Ring cloud storage, which users can review from anywhere in the Ring or Astro apps. The benefits of Alexa extend to Astro, providing information, en- tertainment, smart home control and more. Thanks to Intelligent Motion, Astro can follow you from room to room while playing your favourite shows, podcasts or music. It can also deliver re- minders, let you know a timer went off, snap a family photo and notify you of incoming Alexa calls, with the ability to follow you around your home while you’re on the call. Other features include an advanced safety system which, com- bined with a dedicated safety processor, works to detect elements like stairs and obstacles in real-time and on-device processing to handle mass data, including images and raw sensor data while it moves around the home. Owners can designate out-of-bounds zones, so Astro knows where it’s not allowed to go. Like Echo devices, Astro has a microphones/cameras-off button customers can press whenever they wish to turn off cameras, mics and mo- tion. www.amazon.com Jada Brookes looks at some of the latest gadgets and developments on the tech market. New Gadgets on the Go bitegadgets Amazon Introduces Their First Astro Household Robot Images courtesy of Amazon