Social RoboticsSoftBank reportedly halted Pepper production in 2020 after weak demand
Reports said only about 27,000 of the humanoid robots had been made.
Reports from Reuters and Nikkei said SoftBank had stopped making Pepper the previous year because demand was weak, with around 27,000 units built by Foxconn. Sources blamed limited functionality, unreliability and culture clashes between the French robotics unit and Tokyo, and SoftBank planned to cut about half of its 330 roles in France. A spokesperson said production could resume if demand recovered. The news was widely read as a setback for the idea of the humanoid social robot as a mass-market product.
Source: Engadget
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