Kawasaki builds Home LEO, a kneeling home-care robot for elderly people living alone, and targets a fiscal 2028 launch

Kawasaki Heavy Industries said in a press release on Oct 6 that it has completed a prototype of Home LEO, a social robot meant to help elderly people keep living at home. The company says the robot uses physical AI to recognise people and surroundings and act on its own: it talks with the user and learns their habits and preferences, watches for falls, changes in physical condition, unattended fire hazards and visitors, helps with moving around the home and finding and handing over items, and, with the user's consent, shares care data with hospitals and nursing facilities; Kawasaki notes that some of these functions are still to be implemented.

The prototype measures 640 mm long, 675 mm high and 390 mm wide, rising to 830 mm when kneeling. Kawasaki plans demonstration trials with the health and industry ministries, local governments, care providers and AI companies, aiming for a launch in fiscal 2028.

Home LEO would extend a healthcare line that already includes the hinotori surgical robot, the FORRO delivery robot and the Nyokkey semi-humanoid into the home. It follows Kawasaki's physical-AI centre with NVIDIA and Microsoft in San Jose that MEKAWIRE covered in May, and gives the group a dated consumer-care product at a time when most Japanese makers' physical-AI work remains in factories.