Hasta La Gadget!

The world is becoming increasingly populated with robots, and consumers are eating it up. Now, the latest robot to hit the market will help you keep your calories down in the process. PCH International, the company that teams with startups and bigger brands to help manufacture and distribute hardware products, has announced its latest project: a partnership with Intuitive Automata to develop Autom, a $199 “healthcare robot coach” designed to help people lose weight.

Autom, as the robot is called, is designed as a personal lifestyle coach: it takes in data about the person who owns it and gradually adapts its responses to keep you on track. “The more it learns about the individual user, the more it customizes the feedback advice to keep the individual motivated,” the companies said in a statement.

The idea here is that although there are dozens of apps and some hardware on the market today designed to help people stay healthy and eat well — a product of the big interest in “quantified self” technology — having a physical presence sitting in your kitchen, which is learning about and responding to what you do in there, will be a more effective, engaging and fun way of approaching the challenge of losing weight and eating healthy. Intuitive says that this is based on actual research that indicates that robots “create a more powerful and long-lasting relationship with the user than a mobile phone app or a computer.” On top of the $199 price, monthly subscriptions to use the service begin at $19 per user.

Autom looks to be around a foot tall, and in addition to her own active belly, she has a set of eyes that follow you around the room and can blink and wink for extra effect. Watchful eyes in particular seem apt for a robot helping you watch what you eat.

As for the belly, it acts as a kind of dashboard for your food intake, where you can input what you eat, track how many calories you have consumed, and figure out what you need to do to keep yourself in line (that’s the part that presumably shows off how well Autom is getting to know you). Autom talks to you to offer suggestions in an unflappably calm female voice.

The news was announced today by PCH on stage at the Dublin Web Summit. PCH is headquartered in Ireland and manufactures its products in China. Other notable deals PCH has made include a partnership with LittleBits in July to produce the company’s LEGO-style electronic modelling pieces as part of a mass-market push for the hardware company founded by Ayah Bdeir, a TED Fellow and MIT Media Lab alum. In June, PCH also purchased its own design studio Lime Lab to get further involved in the design and production process.

Robots and robotics have had a major boost, with crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter giving inventors a new platform for raising funds and attention for their big ideas. And people who are better known for their software prowess are also investing in robotics. LittleBits is backed by True Ventures and Khosla Ventures. Foundry Group, which has recently raised a $225 million fund, invests in Modular Robots.

And Dmitry Grishin, the CEO of Mail.ru, has his own robotics investment: Grishin Robotics, which recently made its first investment, $225,000 into Double Robotics, a TC Disrupt Hardware Alley finalist.

“The important thing to look at the hardware and robotics business is that everyone knows you can start a software company with two or three engineers, but now the same goes for hardware and robotics companies,” Grishin said earlier today on stage at the Web Summit.

PCH says that the intention is to produce Autom on a mass scale “to help [Intuitive] cater for huge consumer demand.” A spokesperson for the company says that they are not yet disclosing when it will become available confirmed delivery will be in Q2 2013 at the latest. But here you can see a larger-than-life version on stage from earlier today. Below is the actual size as it will appear on your kitchen counter.

Autom is being developed as part of the PCH Accelerator program, which helps hardware startups bring smart ideas to market.

“We have been exploring the new consumer robotics market and have found a perfect opportunity in helping Intuitive Automata scale and bring Autom to market,” said Liam Casey, CEO of PCH International, in a statement today. “Dr. Cory Kidd, founder and CEO of Intuitive, has the vision and energy to make Autom a common device in every home and we are delighted to partner with him to make his vision a reality.”

There’s also a demo video below to show off more of her features.

(main photo credit via)

Apple has lost an appeal against a ruling in a U.K. High Court that Samsung’s Galaxy Tab does not infringe the iPad’s design. The original ruling by Judge Colin Birss said Samsung’s tablets were not cool enough to be confused with Apple’s because they lacked the “extreme simplicity” of the iPad. That ruling has now been upheld by the Court of Appeal.

The original ruling also stated that Apple must run adverts on its website and in newspaper saying Samsung did not copy the iPad. Reuters reports that the Court of Appeal’s Judge Kitchin said today the notices must be in a font size no smaller than Ariel 14.

Samsung provided the following statement

We welcome the court’s judgment, which reaffirmed our position that our GALAXY Tab products do not infringe Apple’s registered design right. We continue to believe that Apple was not the first to design a tablet with a rectangular shape and rounded corners and that the origins of Apple’s registered design features can be found in numerous examples of prior art. Should Apple continue to make excessive legal claims in other countries based on such generic designs, innovation in the industry could be harmed and consumer choice unduly limited.

We’ve also reached out to Apple for comment and will update with any response. the company said it has no comment on the court’s decision.

While Android 4.2 is not the next major version of Android, many have talked about it and there are reportedly a ton of new features and changes that are expected to be introduced. Perhaps Android 4.2 will be formally introduced at Google’s Android event on the 29^th of October, but the folks at Android Police have managed to find out some of the features in the upcoming update thanks to a LG Nexus system dump. The write-up is pretty long and detailed, and covers some features such as SELinux, Always-On VPN, and Premium SMS Confirmation amongst others. Now it is unclear as to whether all those features will make it to the final release, and it is no guarantee that everything will be included, but for those who want to get an idea of what they can look for, just head on over to Android Police’s website for the breakdown!

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Oppo Find 5 is a quad-core monster of a smartphone, Walmart leaks out T-Mobile smartphone pricing details,

If you own an Xbox console and you would love to pair your Xbox 360 controller with your Nexus 7, thanks to a user over at the XDA forums, you now can! While gaming controllers paired with Android devices aren’t exactly new, compatibility with the Xbox 360 controller has been missing all this while. We’re not sure why, perhaps it might be a rivalry between Microsoft and Google and the whole Windows Phone versus Android debate, but whatever the case, you now can. Now the bad news is that it will require you to root your Nexus 7 tablet, so if you haven’t done so already, you will need to. If you’re not sure how to, you might want to do a bit of homework before proceeding. However for those with rooted Nexus 7 tablets, pop on over to the XDA forums to get your hands on the mod that will now let you pair your wireless Xbox 360 controller with your device.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Nexus 7 tablet is best selling Android tablet in the UK, Nexus 7 to gain $100 model and 32GB model?,

A London High Court judge ruled back in July that Samsung hadn’t copied the Apple iPad with its Galaxy Tab 10. As you might expect, that really didn’t set well with Apple who remained convinced that Samsung was slavishly copying everything it produced. Apple appealed the court ruling and as of this week, Apple has lost that appeal with the judge again ruling that Samsung didn’t copy the iPad.

The judge humorously stated when he made the initial ruling that the Samsung tablet wasn’t “cool” like the iPad because it lacks the “extreme simplicity which is possessed by the Apple design.” It wasn’t humorous for Apple was the fact that the judge ordered Cupertino to run advertisements stating that Samsung had not copied the iPad.

The judge that oversaw the case is Judge Birss, and the judge stipulated that the ads noting that Samsung hadn’t copied iPad had to remain on Apple’s website for at least six months. The judge also stipulated that Apple would have to run other ads “to correct the damaging impression” that Samsung was copying Apple designs. The ads are to be placed in various magazines and newspapers.

Apple may have lost in this round of the patent battle with Samsung, but it has had success in winning sales bans on some Samsung products around the world. The biggest win Apple has racked up so far was when a jury in the US ruled for Apple in the patent battle and awarded them $1.05 billion after it was found that Samsung infringed on several Apple software patents. Naturally, Samsung is appealing the verdict. Perhaps Samsung will have to run ads on its website and in magazines stating that it copied Apple designs.

[via BBC News]

Apple loses Samsung tablet appeal: Must pay for apology adverts is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
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