Piaggio turned its cute follow robot into a Star Wars droid

Since 2017, the Vespa-maker Piaggio's Fast Forward division has been exploring a unique way to cut down on car trips: Building robots that can follow you around and carry your stuff. We called its original Gita (pronounced "jee-tah," Italian for "trip") robot an attractive rolling porter, but its size and initial $3,250 price made it more of a robo-curio than something you'd actually want to buy. The company followed that up with the Gitamini, a smaller and slightly cheaper $1,850 model, but even that remains niche.

Most people just don't have thousands of dollars to spend on a cute follow bot — but the calculation may be different for Star Wars fans. Squint a bit, and Piaggio's devices don't look that different from BB-8, R2-D2 and the multitude of other droids. So it's not a huge surprise to see Piaggio Fast Forward debut a special Star Wars edition robot: the G1T4-M1N1. It's basically just a $2,875 version of the Gitamini (which now sells for $2,475) with Star Wars decals and sound effects.

Devindra Hardawar for Engadget

G1T4-M1N1 boasts all of the same specs as the Gitamini: It can carry up to 20 pounds in its top compartment; it lasts for 7 hours, or 24 miles; and its speed tops out at a jaunty 6 MPH. But like a true Star Wars droid, it's more talkative than its older sibling. Lucasfilm offered up some of its unique sound effects for the bot, so you might hear it sound extra flustered as it's rushing to catch up to you, or turning quickly around a corner. It's a big leap beyond the Sphero-powered BB8 toy from 2015.

I had a chance to spend a weekend with G1T4-M1N1 at my home, but unfortunately I couldn't take it outside or use it in public, where it's really meant to shine. Instead, it was stuck puttering around my home and deck. While that delighted my kids — who both jumped in the air the moment G1T4-M1N1 awoke with a loud boot-up sound — they were still frustrated they could't pile their toys into its compartment and walk it to the neighborhood park.

From my brief time with it, I can confirm G1T4-M1N1 followed me around like an eager droid, ready to carry whatever I needed. But it also had some trouble navigating around my cluttered floors — if it hit any major obstacle or corner, it would go to standby mode until I tapped the capacitive button on its noggin. Unlike my Roomba vacuums, it doesn't back up and try again. I also had to be extremely careful with the G1T4-M1N1 around my deck stairs, since it continually tried to fall to its death like a robotic lemming.

According to Piaggio Fast Forward CEO and co-founder Greg Lynn, the company expects bot owners to watch out for major "cliff" drops like stairs. Gitamini and Gita have the ability to pause before jumping over large curb drops, he says, but I couldn't see that in action.

Devindra Hardawar for Engadget

Between its trouble with stairs and obstacle avoidance, I couldn't imagine ever using any Gita robot indoors without headaches. But I could see it being useful if I still lived in Brooklyn, where it could accompany my kids and I to the park while lugging their gear. (My aching back sure would appreciate that, anyway.) I could also see parking it outside a local grocery store and having it follow me home afterwards.

Even in that dream scenario, though, I'd worry about someone trying to steal the G1T4-M1N1. While you can lock it down from an app, which closes the storage compartment and turns off any following capability, you still have to remember to do that manually. According to Lynn, he's seen curious strangers accidentally enable the Gita bots' following feature more than he's encountered stories of potential theft. Still, the worry is there, especially since the G1T4-M1N1 and Gitamini weigh 28 pounds. It's not hard to imagine some intrepid thief driving up to a parked G1T4-M1N1 and throwing it in their car. (Unfortunately, there's no way to physically chain it like a bike, either.)

I'm not making any final judgements on the G1T4-M1N1, or its siblings, since I couldn't test it properly. But it's clearly not something meant for everyone — not at that price, and not with the navigation problems I encountered. But I could see a future where assistive robots like these could be helpful. We currently have robots delivering food on the streets of some cities, and I've seen them helping waiters move food around local restaurants. At some point, we'll see cheaper and more useful home bots beyond the Roomba and its ilk. And whatever comes next will likely owe a debt to the ground being tread by Gita's large wheels.

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