The new workers were quick to complete mundane tasks like fetching coffee and delivering meals. They were not in anyone's way or in violation of personal space. They waited quietly for elevators. They did not whine.
They were not human.
Naver is a soup-to-nuts internet conglomerate in South Korea. Inside a futuristic, stark industrial, 36-story high-rise on the outskirts of Seoul, a fleet of about 100robots cruise around on their own, moving from floor to floor on robot-only elevators and sometimes next to humans, rolling through security gates and entering meeting rooms
Naver's network of web services, including a search engine, maps, email and news aggregation, is dominant in South Korea, but it is not well known outside of the country. The company is trying to find new ways to grow. It agreed to acquire Poshmark for over $1 billion in October. Naver sees the software that powers robots in corporate offices as a product that other companies will eventually want.
The white-collar world of cubicles and conference rooms is not the only place in which robots are found. Privacy experts say that a machine teeming with cameras and sensors in company hallways could be a bad idea. There is a complicated challenge in designing a space where machines are free to move.
Naver has done a lot of research to make sure that its robots behave in a way that makes employees feel comfortable. As it develops its own robot privacy rules, it hopes to create a template for the office robot of the future.
Naver Labs, a subsidiary developing the robots, is trying to minimize the discomfort they cause to humans, according to an executive at the company.
The social impact team member ordered coffee on the Naver app. The person exited the elevator on the 23rd floor and went to her desk. A cup of iced coffee that had been prepared at a Starbucks on the second floor was opened by the robot.
Sometimes the robot stops too far from where she is and other times it moves slower than expected.
She uses the tech term for software that is still under development to describe them. She said that the deliveries help her focus on her work and eliminate the distraction of going to a coffee shop.
Naver uses its employees as test subjects for future workplace technologies by turning its entire office into a research and development lab.
When Naver employees go to work, they are automatically reminded of where they parked on the workplace app. Even though security gates use facial recognition, employees walk through them. Artificial intelligence software is used at Naver's in-house health clinic.
There are also the humans.
The office was designed by Naver with the help of the robot. When a robot approaches, every door is opened. There is no obstruction on the floor. The ceilings are marked with numbers and barcodes. The cafeteria has robot delivery lanes.
The field of human-robot interaction has been studied by Naver. Naver concluded that the best place for a robot in an elevator with humans was the corner next to the entrance on the side opposite of the elevator buttons. Naver's researchers found that putting the robot at the back of the elevator made people uneasy.
Engineers at the company designed animated eyes that look at the robot in a certain direction. If employees could see the robot's gaze, they would be better able to anticipate its movements.
The machines don't look like humans. The company didn't want people to think thatrobots would act like humans. Some people think that humanoid robots make people more uncomfortable.
Naver isn't the only company trying to improve robot technology. In office buildings, shopping malls and convenience stores around Asia, Rice Robotics has deployed hundreds of cartoonish, boxyrobots that deliver packages, groceries and more. The prototypes that were unveiled in September are designed to be more like humans, but they are a long way from being put to use.
Victor Lee said he was impressed by the videos of the machines and Naver's robot friendly building. He said that Naver's approach made sense. Naver has more money for these moonshot projects.
The Naver robots are not rolling computers that process information inside the machine. The robots communicate with each other over a high-speed, private 5G network. Data from cameras and sensors is used to process the movements of the robot.
Each robot has a camera that records its surroundings. There was disagreement within Naver about how to use the data collected by the robot. According to Lee Jin-kyu, Naver's chief data protection officer, engineers initially wanted the robot to record a wider field of view to assess their location more quickly and more accurately.
Mr. Lee worried that this would cause legal problems for the company in South Korea because they have strict labor and privacy laws. When more than one image was needed, Mr. Lee and the engineers agreed to only use a front-facing camera.
The images are deleted when the robot has oriented itself. If a robot is knocked over, an emergency mode kicks in. The robot might record people's faces.
Privacy experts worry that potential customers might modify therobots or create their own policies on how they collect data despite Naver's precautions. Kim Borami, a privacy lawyer in South Korea, said that she had seen companies break privacy laws.
It was not possible to know if Naver was following its own privacy policies without looking at its software.
When it comes to privacy violations, you don't usually find out until there is a whistle-blower or a leak.
The company said it was in compliance with South Korean laws. Rules are created on the fly with new technology.
Mr. Lee said there wasn't a benchmark for privacy policies. It was necessary to start from scratch. It was the hardest part.
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