The story appears on

Page A9

December 8, 2017

GET this page in PDF

Free for subscribers

View shopping cart

Related News

HomeWorld

Japan workers find 鈥楾-Frend鈥 in office drone

A drone that hovers over Japanese workers and blares music to force them to go home was unveiled yesterday, as Japan tries to lower its notoriously long work hours.

The 鈥淭-Frend鈥 buzzes over those trying to work late, blasting out the strains of 鈥淎uld Lang Syne,鈥 a Scottish tune typically used in Japan to announce that a store is closing.

鈥淵ou can鈥檛 really work when you think 鈥榠t鈥檚 coming over any time now鈥 and hear 鈥楢uld Lang Syne鈥 along with the buzz,鈥 said Norihiro Kato, a director at Taisei, an office security and cleaning firm that co-developed the system.

The drone is equipped with a camera, which stores footage on an SD card. Office scenes can also be monitored almost in real time from a remote location.

The machine recognises its location on a building floor without GPS.

It takes off from its port, makes a surveillance flight on a pre-set path and then returns autonomously.

Taisei plans to start the T-Frend service in April in partnership with drone system developer Blue Innovation and telecoms operator NTT East.

The fee for the service is yet to be officially set but 鈥渢he target price鈥 is about 500,000 yen (US$4,500) a month, said Kato.


 

Copyright 漏 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.

娌叕缃戝畨澶 31010602000204鍙

Email this to your friend