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GeckoSystems Adds Voice Control Feature to its Safepath Wheelchairs

GeckoSystems Intl. Corp., a provider of mobile service robots (MSR's) announced an enhancement to its SafePath wheelchair navigation solution with the integration of GeckoChat verbal interaction.

The SafePath voice-controlled wheelchair will give the user complete control with no need for pre-mapping by a caregiver, as it is a completely autonomous AI navigation system using GeckoNav, its maker explained in a press release.

Quadriplegics and others who have control of speech but are unable to reliably manipulate a joystick control will benefit from these enhanced wheelchairs with voice control. GeckoNav is an innovative automatic, self-navigation system created by GeckoSystems that merges AI and robotic technologies with traditional steering and locomotion systems.

GeckoChat has been designed for GeckoSystems' elder care and personal assistance robot the CareBot. It is used in dispensing medication and scheduling reminders and record compliance for the care receiver.

Armed with GeckoChat and the SafePath mobile robot solution, the disabled users will be able to enter a totally unknown indoor space and safely explore it by voice command. With embedded GeckoNav technology, the SafePath solution can be used to avoid obstacles and achieve endpoints. The user, for future reference, may mark endpoints and waypoints by the system so that multiple verbal commands may be replaced by one single verbal command.

GeckoSystems SafePath technologies are a constellation of AI solutions: GeckoSuper(tm), GeckoNav, GeckoImager(tm), GeckoSteer(tm) and GeckoMotorController(tm) software. Like all GeckoSystems software, GeckoChat is an extensible AI paradigm. It uses speech recognition/synthesis protocols available in 13 languages, therefore SafePath enabled voice-controlled chairs can be used worldwide.

There are approximately 2.2 million people in the United States alone that use a wheelchair for everyday activities. Approximately 15 percent of those people now use power wheelchairs. GeckoSystems believes that the availability of SafePath Enabled wheelchairs along with joysticks or alternative control devices (such as GeckoChat, sip and puff, and neural controls) could easily double or triple the size of the power wheelchair market.

GeckoSystems' SafePath mobile robot solutions have gone beyond the R&D concept and it is now ready to hit the market. Once GeckoSystems has created and tested a software calibration tool for GeckoImager, the company plans to market an aftermarket upgrade kit for power wheelchairs already in service.

Few months back, GeckoSystems announced the shipment of an advanced version of the BaseBot to its partner company, ZMP of Japan.


Edited by Brooke Neuman

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