Video: Ikea developing robotic furniture for small living spaces
Peter Brown | June 06, 2019Ikea is working with U.S. startup Ori to develop robotic furniture designed to turn small spaces into smart spaces.
Because more and more people are living in cities, housing resources have become unsustainable. In a small space, it is difficult to find all the storage necessary for the home, especially in big cities where apartments are often compact in order to accommodate mass urbanization.
The Rognan brand would allow furniture to become smart and capable of changing with the push of a button based on Ori’s robotic platform. For instance, a closet can move into a room, allowing for easier access, or a couch can move to reveal a bed underneath, or drawers can emerge from a wall unit for additional storage.
Ikea said the furniture allows homeowners to get at least eight square meters of extra living space for a bedroom, work space or living room. The furniture isn’t smaller, but packs more into a tighter area controlled through robotics.
The first launch of the robotic furniture will take place in Hong Kong and Japan in 2020 and the company may bring the Rognan brand to other regions later.
Ori initially started selling robotic furniture in the U.S. two years ago, but working with Ikea will reportedly expand its reach. While Ori’s system connects through a home’s Wi-Fi and works with Amazon Alexa, it is unclear if the same will apply to Ikea’s brand.
Why would your choice to transform your bed into a couch need to be transmitted to a server, outside of your home ?
Would Amazon then use this information to track your habits and use the info to tailor specific advertisements to sell the customer more products. ?
It is one thing to have an on demand, owner controlled device to order a single product and another thing to have a 24/7 server controlled monitoring system.
Incidentally, a couch that turns into a bed, that turns back into a couch, is called a futon.
Nothing revolutionary, its origin stretches back well over 1000 years.
In reply to #2
Ah, but did it say Ikea on it?
Also, will these be self assembling or the standard Ikea torture device??
Yeah... not exciting me much... I have seen much better examples of flexible furniture than this, which I would hesitate to call 'robotic' anyway - "powered" maybe?
The Japanese have tons of this sort of stuff already. My pick was the living area wall unit that changed into a very functional micro kitchen and had a wardrobe and bed in it too. It did suffer from not being conducive for having breakfast in bed, but that seems not to be a thing in Japan!