00:05a new kind of delivery robot has arrived in the United Kingdom and this one can walk parcel
00:11company every is trialing iris a two-legged robot in Barnsley in the north of England developed by
00:19refined robotics the first of its kind tests will see how iris navigates uneven ground and stairs
00:27now Nick Hafner is the chief executive of refined robotics joining us now Nick exciting times I
00:33understand it's the first trial of its kind in Europe what are all the people of Barnsley
00:39actually seeing or will they see so in Barnsley we're trialing this technology and this is the
00:46first time as you said it's the first time we've deployed this in Europe so they will see a two
00:50legged robot with wheels for feet traveling around four miles per hour six kilometers per hour along
00:57pavements carrying parcels for every and we'll actually be delivering those unattended delivery
01:03to people's doorstep so the robot will drive along maybe climb up one or two steps and then squat down
01:10and gently drop off the parcel actually at the doorstep and then lead on its own how does it
01:15navigate steps with wheels so it's got wheels but it also has legs and the wheels are actually the
01:22feet of the legs so when the ground is flat it can just roll the wheels and move energy efficiently
01:27but once it gets to some steps it can lock the wheels in place and actually take steps just like
01:31a human up those staircases is it going to be effective in rainy snowy slippery conditions as well
01:42so we've tested the robot in the snow um and currently the design has challenges doing staircases
01:47in the snow but actually this is more of a grip problem rather than a technological problem so as
01:52we improve the tires if we add um better grippy tires designed specifically for snow we should be
01:58able to handle that type of terrain okay because we are heading into winter soonish in the UK yes the
02:03north is known for its cold weather um how many robots will you have out on the streets of Barnsley
02:08has it begun and how long will it be trialed for so yeah um this trial is an initial two
02:15-week long
02:16trial period it started on Monday last week and we had an initial one week of preparation before that
02:21week so we've got one more week remaining of this initial trial and based on those results we will
02:26then explore with every whether this uh it continues or doesn't obviously i can't comment on on that at
02:31this stage um was there a second part of the question well i want to know what people think i
02:37mean
02:37what are the what are the humans of Barnsley make of this um so i i haven't had time to
02:44talk directly
02:45to the humans of Barnsley mostly i've been focused on um on the trial uh however from what i've gathered
02:52from people who have spoken and also from people we've spoken to in other deployments in Tokyo
02:56um the machines because they move um a little more jauntily than some standard delivery robots that
03:02are on wheels it actually feels a little bit more alive and human-like um and it doesn't feel quite
03:06as mechanical or machine-like as some of these other robots um on the other hand i do see people
03:12stepping to the side when they see it coming they've never seen something like this before and it's
03:15obviously it's quite different so people are cautious i've got to ask you about the costs obviously
03:20every startup has costs but how soon might this technology be completely cost effective
03:26uh for delivery companies in the uk and across europe
03:32um it's a good question uh now there's quite a lot of factors that affect this but very briefly
03:39um we've already dropped the cost by about a half from when we started the company so it's it's getting
03:45a lot cheaper very quickly um and that's influenced by a lot of factors um which would take me a
03:51long
03:51to explain sure um but i think within the next two to three years it will reach a quite a
03:56cost
03:56effective point assuming we can produce the robots in large enough quantities i i know that part of
04:01it is to help with the last mile of the delivery but surely there's a point at which it's going
04:06to
04:07become cheaper to use a robot compared to a human delivery person uh i think that is not entirely true
04:17i think there are cases where a human delivery person can make better judgments better decisions
04:21uh than a robot can um and actually i'm much more interested in seeing workers work together with
04:27the robots so if these robots can carry the heavier packages to sort of protect the driver's backs to
04:32reduce the sort of physical pain that they go through a lot of drivers do end up with long-term
04:37lower back injuries or wrist injuries or shoulder injuries from carrying payloads around everywhere
04:43um that's one case where we we're quite excited about how this technology can work together with
04:48the drivers and improve the amount of output they do rather than just completely replacing them
04:53sounds very interesting indeed and look forward to the results of your barnsley pilot
04:57robots thanks so much that's nick hafner chief executive of refined robotics
05:03you
