If you were admitted in a hospital for
treatment wouldn't you like sympathy, hand holding and 24/7 pampering? And who
says it only has to be a human attendant. Coimbatore-based startup Vishnu
Engineering has come up with a prototype for a robot with emotional intelligence.
With clients ranging from banks to
clothing retailers, the five-year-old startup hopes to get robots more
regularly deployed in concierge service. Founded in 2012, Vishnu Engineering is
the brainchild of mechanical engineer Vijay V Shah, 38. A graduate of
Vaishnav College of Engineering, Chennai, in 2004, Vijay's first job was as
a mechanical engineer with the Shimato Group. "I saved up
money from my earnings to launch my own mechanical workshop in Coimbatore. We
fitted out hydraulic machines for the fabrication and automotive industry. I
then started building my own models for pumps and two-wheelers. Then I got
hooked into robotics," says Vijay.
Why Vishnu Engineering? "I was waiting at a bank branch, when I realised how monotonous the life of a bank teller was. Over and over I found they were answering the same set of queries, performing the same tasks. I thought such routine tasks could easily be automated to save precious time, so that they can cater to more sophisticated needs such as possible investments of bank customers," says Vijay. And he hit it big when he designed India's first banking robot 'Lakshmi'. "Apart from answering generic questions, Vijay also programmed the robot to connect to the core banking solution. If a customer wants to know his bank account details or transaction history, the robot can flash the answer on its display," says N Kamakodi, MD and CEO, City Union Bank (CUB), which has now six clones of Lakshmi at different branches. "From account history, interest rates on home loans, deferred payments, charges, CUB Lakshmi has been able to answer them all," he adds.
After CUB became its first client, other banks
like Canara Bank, Syndicate Bank soon sought Vishnu Engineering's
services. Today, the startup is also catering to other sectors such as telecom
companies, hightrend clothing companies, malls and airports. In 2017, Vishnu
Engineering was also awarded — 'Most Innovative Company of the Year 2017' by
the SWITCH
Foundation. "In the last five
years, my team strength has grown from two to 20. We have also built close to
160 robots in the last five years, which are actively deployed. Our robots can
talk in 20 languages, including Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada. They have
been imbued with natural language processing, so that they can converse with
ease," says Vijay.
Among Vishnu Engineering's other projects are
using robotics to support Aadhaar systems and insurance companies to expand in
rural areas. "For JLL, the real estate consulting firm, we designed robots
for R&D application. We are now excited about a robot for airports that can
tell passengers PNR status, flight delays, hand over boarding passes, direct
them, point out routes to gates or the cafeteria," says Vijay. But the
biggest project for Vishnu Engineering is its work with hospitals. "We are
designing robots with intuitive understanding and empathy. With AI, we hope our
robots can calm down patients, talk to them. We want them to have the human
touch as we increasingly move into a world, where humans don't prioritise
relationships as much as they should; don't have the time to even say "hello"
or visit their near and dear ones," says Vijay.
Source: THE TIMES OF INDIA (Chennai) -20th November,2017
