Robots Begin Earning Their Keep

Think of a complex mechanical device and the fragrance that comes to mind is probably oil, right? Not necessarily in Japan, where a humanoid robot has replaced a supermodel at the center of a perfume advertising campaign.

The use, by Guerlain for its Cherry Blossom fragrance, is just the latest in a growing number of examples of companies employing humanoid robots to do what was once the job of humans.

For the campaign, Guerlain looked to robot and fashion designer Tatsuya Matsui. After making a name for himself in a government sponsored robot project, Matsui created his own company and worked with SGI Japan, a local unit of Silicon Graphics, to create a robot named 'Posy.' Designed after the flower girls that present bouquets to dignitaries at various functions, the robot is one of the more polished and feminine looking humanoids yet developed by Japan's fast expanding robot industry.

An Instant Success?

The advertising campaign started in February this year, just ahead of the roughly week-long period when cherry blossoms are in bloom that signifies the beginning of spring in Japan, and has been very successful, says Kazuko Yoshida, a spokesperson for Guerlain.

The robot appeared at the launch of the perfume in two stores and its image is used on promotional material for the perfume.

"First day sales [at the Isetan department store in Tokyo] were [$30,000]," she says. That's around four times the average single day sales of competitor company products in the same store, she adds. To March 28, sales have been running at just over double the level of last year.

Posy is not the only creation of Matsui's to have found fame and employment. The 'Pino' humanoid robot that he helped create as part of the Japanese government-funded Kitano Symbiotic Systems Project became an overnight celebrity when it appeared alongside Hikaru Utada, one of Japan's most popular female pop singers, in a music video--a role also played by Sony's Aibo entertainment robot in a Janet Jackson music video a year earlier.

Fame and Fortune

Honda Motor's Asimo humanoid robot, well known to many Japanese after it starred in a series of Honda TV commercials, is also earning a monthly pay check. Aside from its TV work for Honda, the robot has been employed in a string of part-time jobs, such as recently working at IBM Japan to welcome and guide visitors, and in February this year it rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange to commemorate the anniversary of Honda's listing on the exchange.

Asimo's most recent gig is at Japan's National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation. The museum is paying Asimo an annual salary of $150,000 to guide visitors in the robot exhibition area and even held a ceremony to issue the robot with its orders in January.

So could this be the start of something big and just what Japan needs to combat a shrinking workforce as the birthrate continues to decline?

Not quite--at least not yet. At tens of thousands of dollars per robot and a level of technology that requires operators and maintenance, the robots are still someway from replacing humans in even the most basic jobs but Guerlain's Yoshida isn't ruling out putting another robot at the center of another promotion.

"I think this is the beginning," she says.