Omiefe Africa’s First Humanoid Robot Built By Nigerians

As the world takes a U-turn in inventions ranging from smartphones, and drones, and now with the latest inventions of humanoid (robots).

The humanoid robot was unveiled at the world’s biggest technology event, Gitex, which took place at Dubai World Trade Centre, from October 10th to 14th.

The humanoid robot named Omeife was created by Uniccon Group of Companies, one of Nigeria’s fastest-growing technology startups that offers eclectic, innovative technology solutions to businesses and government agencies across Africa.

The first Al-humanoid was named Sophia.

Sophia was first activated on February 14, 2016. The robot, modeled after the ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti, Audrey Hepburn, and its inventor’s wife, Amanda Hanson, is known for its human-like appearance and behavior compared to previous robotic variants. As of 2018, Sophia’s architecture includes scripting software, a chat system, and OpenCog, an AI system designed for general reasoning. Sophia imitates human gestures and facial expressions and is able to answer certain questions and to make simple conversations on predefined topics (e.g. on the weather). Sophia uses speech recognition technology from Alphabet Inc. (the parent company of Google) and is “designed to get smarter over time”.^{[citation needed]} Its speech synthesis ability is provided by CereProc‘s text-to-speech engine, and also allows it to sing. Sophia’s intelligence software is designed by Hanson Robotics. The AI program analyses conversations and extracts data that allows it to improve responses in the future.

Hanson designed Sophia to be a suitable companion for the elderly at nursing homes, or to help crowds at large events or parks. He has said that he hopes that the robot can ultimately interact with other humans sufficiently to gain social skills. Sophia is marketed as a “social robot” that can mimic social behavior and induce feelings of love in humans.

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Sophia has at least nine robot humanoid “siblings” who were also created by Hanson Robotics.^[17] Fellow Hanson robots are Alice, Albert Einstein Hubo, BINA48, Han, Jules, Professor Einstein, Philip K. Dick Android, Zeno, and Joey Chaos. Around 2019–20, Hanson released “Little Sophia” as a companion that could teach children how to code, including support for Python, Blockly, and Raspberry Pi.

Sophia Biography Credit: Wikipedia