Qihan Sanbot Nano Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET

This cute bot wants to help keep an eye on your smart home.

Tyler Lizenby/CNET

Helper robots are becoming a thing and Qihan’s cute Sanbot Nano is the latest iteration, announced at Europe’s largest tech conference. The Sanbot Nano will be available for purchase in October for a cool $2,800 in the United States. That price converts to roughly £2,170 and AU$3,530 at the current exchange rate.

In addition to its friendly disposition, the always-smiling Sanbot Nano is also outfitted with a ton of tech. 

Standing at 2.7 feet tall, this helper bot has over 50 sensors designed to help it navigate, keep an eye on your home and even control your connected devices. Qihan specifically mentions upcoming support for “the world’s most popular connected home brands” in lighting, thermostats and appliances. 

As far as surveillance goes, Qihan’s Q-Link app gives you access to a live video stream of whatever the Sanbot Nano sees, as well as the ability to control the bot remotely anywhere you have internet access. The robot’s object detection sensors are supposed to help it watch over the house and sound an alarm if unexpected activity takes place. 

We’ve seen our fair share of bots like the Sanbot Nano within the last year — LG’s Hub Robot, Mayfield Robotics’ Kuri and Ubitech Lynx immediately come to mind. Like the LG Hub and the Ubitech Lynx, Qihan says the Sanbot Nano will work with Amazon Alexa

So what separates the Sanbot from the rest of the bunch? For starters, LG’s Hub Robot and many other helper bots are still just neat concepts that you can’t find in stores. That isn’t so with Sanbot; Qihan expects to launch a retail version of its Sanbot Nano this October. Obviously, we really want to test one out at the CNET Smart Home

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