Close encounters of the robotic kind

A robot housekeeping staff-cum-waiter and a robotic surveillance system - gridAIDE and gridSURV respectively are two products that can provide security and service to hotel guests. By Sudipta Dev

Pulkit Gaur

Robots being used in hotels is not a far fetched futuristic idea or an exclusivity that few international properties can boast about; an Ahmedabad-based startup, Gridbots, has come up with two robotic products that are ideal for the hospitality sector in India: gridSURV - an automatic surveillance system that can do threat detection and take requisite action, and the gridAIDE - a robot that can clean rooms, engage in interactive customer experience and can also serve as a robotic waiter.

Both the robotic products are suitable for medium and large hotels. "For gridAIDE, the idea originated after we got orders from a few hoteliers to use our robots for the cleaning requirements in their hotels - we worked on the whole concept from scratch and came up with a customised version of the autoGRID robot which was more relevant and useful for the hotel industry," says Pulkit Gaur, founder and chief technology officer of Gridbots. The young entrepreneur and his team thought of developing gridSURV after witnessing the security lapses due to manual errors or loopholes in the existing system. They decided to customise their machine vision technology for the purpose of surveillance and threat detection.

To the aid

Robots have been popular for housekeeping purposes, particularly in the consumer category. iRobot has sold worldwide millions of Roomba and Scooba - the best known robots for vacuum cleaning and floor-washing, respectively. Gridbot's gridAIDE can do much more than that. In fact, the company's autoGRID consumer robots have been customised for the hotel industry and this specific version is called the gridAIDE series of robots.

gridAIDE can store upto 10 or more rooms in its memory while working and can be used for housekeeping purposes in hotels. "These robots exhibit smart behaviour and can clean a vast area automatically-without any human intervention," states Gaur. gridAIDE robots go for charging automatically when they sense that they are running out of charge, they can also sense the environment and will ensure they never hit someone while working.

These robots employ automatic cleaning technology very similar to autoGRID robots and can also avoid obstacles. They have touch panels with serving trays so that they can provide information and take orders from guests staying in the hotel. gridAIDE can also help in serving customers.

"The robot can be programmed using a simple graphical user interface (GUI) which has been designed taking into consideration only one factor - simplicity. So whenever the user wants the robot to perform any particular task, he needs to use the GUI to drag and drop the functionalities or select from a library of existing modules. Once done, the robot can be programmed and is ready for use. It will remember the cleaning cycle map once the user feeds in the map. This enables the robot to do a better job of cleaning as compared to other products," states Gaur.

Being programmable, you can make it move from one room to another via the map interface. autoGRID is equipped with various sensors for temperature, light sensor and obstruction, which provides it with the ability to interact and understand its surrounding environment better.

A new approach to surveillance

The heightened levels of security in hotels has led to the need of a surveillance and tracking system that can do much more than static CCTV cameras that are installed everywhere.

"All big hotels always have high profile visitors and providing a high and sophisticated level of security is a must for these properties. No one would like to witness something similar which happened at the Taj in Mumbai," points out Gaur.

gridSURV can help bridge the security gap effectively. The system can detect any unauthorised person walking in the hotel premises and immediately inform the person concerned through SMS or e-mail alert. They can also raise an alarm instantly. The system can be monitored using desktop applications, web browser or a mobile.

"gridSURV comes with moving cameras to provide round the clock security. It features automatic detection of faces, hazardous substances, break-ins and can also make the cameras follow the culprit by locking on the target," mentions Gaur. It is a computing device which is connected to the security system of the hotels with robotic cameras which are mobile. All the cameras can be configured for facial detection, motion detection, left over baggage detection, violent activity detection and target locking. This enables the hotel owners a great capability to secure their customers against any kind of threats.

In case of any mishap these cameras can be moved to the incident site without sacrificing someone's life and action can be taken against the offenders remotely.

To enhance the security features of gridSURV, Gridbots is currently in the process of building a database of all fugitives and wanted criminals which will also be integrated in the surveillance system-enabling the detection of any kind of possible crime beforehand.

"Till now people have been installing security cameras and assuming that they are secure, this is not the case because these CCTV cameras are not more than mere video recorders. We provide content analysis, Wi-Fi connectivity of the camera over the internet, face recognition, object recognition and various other facilities with this solution," says Gaur.

It enables real-time monitoring of threats and notifies the user about it using SMS, e-mails, phone calls or raises an alarm through hooters/sirens. This alarm is raised real-time, when the event is taking place - unlike CCTV cameras which are only useful after the incident has happened. The notification is also done through any media, in less than a minute. gridSURV sits between user cameras and their display consoles and takes the video input-analyses it in instantly and takes action if required.

It has a sound and voice analysis software that identifies and classifies unnecessary voices. It can also detect automatically tampering or theft of its camera units and notify immediately. There is also an automatic day-night switching mode.

"We already have happy customers for our products and we have loads of preorders because of the same. Our clients include some leading business houses, a few hotels and some government establishments," states Gaur.

For a service-focused industry, security today has become a key issue. gridSURV and gridAIDE can help the hotel staff in serving their customers more effectively and provide reassurance of a safe stay.