The value opportunities for VGo are vast, not unlike the cellphone market. We are creating a new way of communicating; the robotic telepresence solutions will co-exist with other communication models as an alternative paradigm for when people want to be empowered in a different location not just communicate. When we began the process of developing this robotic telepresence, we had no idea the impact it would have on the handicapped or chronically ill student in providing for an under-served new market: the remote student.

I just got back from a week in Las Vegas at the Consumer Electronics Show. For those of you not familiar with CES, it is one of the largest shows of its kind and had over 150,000 attendees this year. VGo was at the show enabling our partners, including Verizon and Freescale to demonstrate applications for VGo and their solutions.

The concept for the VGo Robotic Telepresence System started to take form in my mind one day while I was sitting in a conference room looking at and talking to a face hanging on a wall... I thought, there must be a better way. The vision of having a device which truly could deliver the promise of being in two places at the same time came from years of watching how the videoconferencing industry was falling short of the promise that video communications always held.

Today, Co-Founder and COO, Tom Ryden, is at the Mass Technology Leadership Council’s Future of Robotics Summit being held at the Microsoft NERD Center in Cambridge, MA.

There will be many presentations from New England area professors, including Holly Yanco of University of Massachusetts – Lowell, who will be showing off “Hugo” – a VGo Robotic Telepresence System that they purchased and augmented during their research. 

The top half of the VGo has been modified with a light-up LED tie used to indicate the robot’s status.  Researchers Katherine Tsui and Munjal Desai, also of UMass, worked with Holly to study ways that Telepresence robots can be used in an office environment.  “Hugo” was also featured in an article my Mission Critical earlier this fall entitled, Robotics at the Water Cooler and at Home; Using Telepresence Robots to Make the Workplace, Home Life More Flexible.  In addition to the workplace, the Katherine is also studying how Telepresence robots can benefit people who are hospitalized, by connecting them with their families in distant locations.