Segway's new hoverboard has an Intel RealSense eye, which is useful for when the self-balancing board morphs into a personal robot. The company showed off the multipurpose hoverboard during a presentation at CES 2016 in Las Vegas on Tuesday.
It's a new leaf for the Segway company, which was recently taken in by China's Ninebot. The new Ninebot Segway aims to be cooler than the traditional Segways, which was rivaled only by Google Glass in the amount of ridicule it received on the streets in the States.
The Ninebot Segway employs a bar-less build, giving users hands-free control over the self-balancing board. But beyond that, the Ninebot Segway has a mind of its own.
"For years, there has been the promise of a personal robot that would provide real help in and around the house," Ninebot says. "This Tuesday at CES, Segway took a big step towards making that dream a reality with its Segway Robot showcase in the opening demo for the CES16 Intel Keynote."
When a rider hops off of the hoverboard, the Ninebot Segway can shape shift into a robot that'll follow that person around, taking pictures and commands.
The robot uses Intel's RealSense camera to make its way around dynamic environments and it can interact with both users and sensors in the home. The robot also has an Intel Atom processor inside.
But just because this thing is a bot doesn't mean it slacks on speed and performance. The Ninebot Segway can hit a top speed of over 11 mph and can travel up to 18 miles on a single charge.
The Ninebot Segway also includes a depth sensing camera, fish eye tracking camera and a camera for taking photos.
The Ninebot Segway can get smarter. The robot's platform is open and compatible with Android, and the company has issued a call on developers to have a go at it.
"Segway plans to make the robot commercially available and will initially introduce a developer kit based on Android platform in second half of this year," Ninebot says. "Developers worldwide will be able to use this SDK to allow the robot to perform new applications and to interact with other devices."
Intel has helped develop the robot's Android-based platform, while Xiaomi has been Ninebot's investor. Both Intel and Xiaomi will accompany the Ninebot Segway along its next steps through the companies established joint engineering and strategic alliance.
The developer edition of the Ninebot Segway is tentatively slated for a Q3 2016 release. And it'll include the full software developer's kit.
