(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)
LAS VEGAS—From my spot in the crowd at LG’s CES press conference, I felt the excitement of the audience swell when CLOiD rolled onto the stage. Essentially, CLOiD is a humanoid robot with lots of moving parts. It navigates on big sturdy wheels. Its torso maintains a low center of gravity, helping it stay balanced, and it can raise and lower as needed for a given task. Its head features a display that can create digital eyes with expressions, as well as speakers that emit an AI-generated voice, a camera, and the chipset that forms the brain of the bot.
CLOiD's arms are the most impressive part. They have mobile shoulders, elbows, and wrists that can bend forward, backward, or laterally. They can rotate as well and have a freedom of mobility designed to replicate the human arm. At the front, the bot's hands also have five actuated fingers capable of fine motion.
LG hasn’t clarified everything CLOiD will be able to do, but a company rep mentioned loading and switching laundry, as well as folding it when it's done. The bot should also be able to load and unload the dishwasher, retrieve food items from the kitchen to transport them, and potentially assist with food preparation by stirring ingredients. It can even pick up items around the house and engage in conversation to adapt to your needs.
CLOiD Is Cool, So Why Am I Skeptical?
I’ve been writing about robots at CES for a long time. I’d love to have one in my home to do my chores for me, and that’s exactly what CLOiD promises to do. But neither the demo itself nor what LG said about it gave me any confidence that this prototype will actually come to fruition.
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During the demo, an LG rep noted that CLOiD is still a prototype that needs fine-tuning. The demo itself felt a little stiff. The robot took a towel from the presenter and tossed it into a laundry machine. However, the presenter had dropped the towel into the robot's hand, and the laundry machine opened on its own as the bot approached. As a result, the task didn’t actually require much in the way of motor function. It also took a beat at each stage to respond and act, making the whole interaction feel slow.
Beyond these specific demos and even beyond CLOiD itself, I've seen concept robots on display at CES for years, including those from major companies like LG and Samsung. LG has shown models that deliver food and act as a home hub. Samsung showed a robot that could empty the dishwasher a few years ago. But while some of LG’s business-facing models have come to fruition, neither company has yet released a functional home helper bot.
The other potential downside to CLOiD, even if it does come to fruition, would be the practicality of owning one. It’ll likely be prohibitively expensive and may require a fleet of compatible LG appliances to make the most of its capabilities.
That said, this is CES, and while we've seen countless prototypes that never make it to market, we've also seen plenty that have. And truly, I’d love to be proven wrong here, because I can't deny that CLOiD seems pretty cool.