New Humanoid Staff Member at Munich Airport

Passengers using Munich Airport at the moment will be greeted by its newest staff member, affectionately known as Josie Pepper. Josie is the first humanoid robot equipped with artificial intelligence, and Munich Airport and Lufthansa are very proud of her.

Josie Pepper stands just over a metre tall, and she is on duty in Terminal 2, greeting passengers as they arrive, and helping them with their enquiries. According to her creators, Josie has ‘sparkling round eyes and a pleasant voice,’ and is currently working within a test phase to gauge passenger reactions to her.

Josie has been hailed as ground-breaking, and she actually speaks to passengers, not just delivering pre-defined speech, but with a ‘brain’ that interacts with airport data via the cloud.

The idea is that she will ‘learn’ about airport systems and will gradually become more proficient with her answers to passenger questions. The system is believed to steadily improve as she learns more, which will lead to more detailed responses over time.

Josie was named by airport staff when she arrived, and was created by SoftBank Robotics, a French company. She speaks fluent English and is equipped with IBM Watson IoT artificial intelligence.