The Lenovo AI Workmate Concept is a desktop robot that can help with productivity features.
Shown for the first time during Mobile World Congress this week, it has garnered a lot of attention, although it's not yet known whether it'll become a full product in future.
Major trade shows are traditionally packed with launches of new devices set to launch in the coming months, but we also often get to see tech concepts that may or may not make it to market.
Lenovo is synonymous with this – often using the likes of CES and IFA to show interesting innovations that wow us. And to be fair, many of them do either become a product down the line, or form the basis of one.
We certainly hope some of the concepts shown at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week turn into something we can buy and use. As an owner of a Legion Go S (SteamOS) gaming handheld, I'm particularly interested in the Legion Go Fold Concept, for example.
But perhaps the most intriguing device making its debut at MWC is a desktop robot that takes the concept of smart assistants to a whole new level.
The Lenovo AI Workmate Concept is a Wall-E style 'bot that sits on your desk and aids you with productivity. It has multimodel input capture, enabling you to interact with projections it spews onto the worktop, and it's powered by AI (of course).
The AI Workmate even has a pair of goggly eyes to make it seem more friendly and useful – like a physical version of Microsoft's Clippy. And it has a whole package of security and privacy technologies to ensure your interactions are safe.
Most of all though, it's cute and about as sci-fi as it gets right now.
Of course, as it's just a proof of concept at present, there are no details on pricing, availability or specifications. Nor do we know what else it could be capable of, bar workflow help.
Still, it's good to see at least one company trying something new, and robots certainly do seem high on the agenda at the minute (just take a look at Honor's Robot Phone).
It'll certainly be interesting to see what else Lenovo (and others) can come up with for the next major tech trade show.
