Sony this week sent
Aibo, its
robotic dog, off to the great kennel in the sky.
The announcement was slipped in to the company's financial presentation on
its results for the three months to the end of December, and came as a shock to
some fans of the popular canine automata.
Aibo was not the only product to get the short end of Sony's stick. The
company has canned its entire robotics division, also putting an end to the
humanoid QRIO
robot and its range of high-end
Qualia
devices.
The company has stated that it intends to refocus on core business such as
music, film and entertainment.
Sony said that product development for Aibo and QRIO has already ceased and
that production will stop by the end of March.
After-sales support will continue, while research and development in the
artificial intelligence developed for Aibo will be redeployed across other
consumer products.
The cull is understood to have come as Sony tightens its belt, while some
believe that the high-end Aibo, which retailed for around $2,000, has been
swamped by competition from cheaper but less complex products such as
Robosapien
and Roboraptor.
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