Sunshine Coast Council in Queensland has welcomed its first robotic recruit.
The Council recently asked the community to help name the humanoid robot and out of the 358 suggestions received, it has settled on ‘Cassie’.
The winning entry came from Alan Wynn and his son Obi who drew inspiration from the Casuarina trees that line the region’s coastline.
Acting Mayor Tim Dwyer said Cassie had been recruited to help council understand the capabilities and functionality of humanoid robots.
“The knowledge we gain from Cassie will be used to find out how robots may be able to assist council staff in the future,” Cr Dwyer said.
“Cassie may be used to showcase locally developed programs, or assist public facing staff in customer service, libraries, or other council centres.
“Now that Cassie has been given a name, we’ll turn our attention toward training her.
“And by training, we mean developing the programs and systems built in.
“Cassie will help up-skill council’s programmers and will provide additional opportunities for them to explore robotics programming.”
Cassie has been brought on board as part of council’s Smart City Implementation program.
Council is continually looking for new technologies and innovative products to trial throughout the organisation.
Cassie can be found at the Sunshine Coast Smart Centre in Caloundra, where she is responsible for greeting guests and helping them take self-tours if staff members are busy with other visitors.
Visitors can interact with her through voice, touch, and gesture recognition.
