A new Guinness World Record for the "Most Robots Dancing Simultaneously" has been set in Guangzhou, Guangdong, China with 1,069 knee-high Dobi robots. The feat was staged by manufacturers WL Intelligent Technology Co Ltd to promote this range of toy robots which can also sing, box, play football and execute kung fu moves.
It was Bruno Maisonnier, founder of Aldebaran Robotics, who pioneered the idea of dancing robots to show off their capabilities when he choreographed a troupe of Naos to perform during a TED Talk in 2013.
Since then it has been Chinese companies that have hit the headlines with record breaking feats. A record was established in March 2016 by UBTECH Robotics Corp in Shenzhen with 540 robots and was quickly superseded in August 2016 by Ever Win Company & Ltd in Qingdao with 1007 units, see One App For 1000+ Dancing Robots To Take World Record
Now a year later the record has been broken by adding another 60 or so units of the Dobi robot that at just 48cm (19 inches) tall can be described as "knee-high". As in the previous record breaking demos, the robots were all programmed via a single group control system.
Dancing is an obvious way to show off the capabilities of a two-legged, humanoid robot and you can see more of it in this video in which you can also see some of its other talents like standing up on its own thanks to a "self stabilization system":
Dobi has 17 servo joints and a 6-axis gyro to provide flexibility and a gait planning algorithm for human-like walking. It has "voice communication" for singing and storytelling and its "eyes" use an LED matrix to signal different states - red for low power, blue for standby mode and green means "Received order".
Dobi is programmable and has various built-in programs including dance, yoga and martial arts which can be controlled from up to 20 metres away via an app that is available for iOS, Android and Windows. It ships from Hong Kong, costing $363.99 plus shipping.
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