Toyota partners with AI startup Preferred Networks on building helper robots for humans

Toyota is enlisting the help of startup Preferred Networks, a Japanese company founded in 2014 with a focus on artificial intelligence and deep learning, to help move forward its goal of developing useful service robots that can assist people in everyday life. The two companies announced a partnership today to collaborate on research and development that will use Toyota's Human Support Robot (HSR) robotics platform. The platform, which Toyota created in 2012 and has been developing since, is a basic robot designed to be able to work alongside people in everyday settings.