Honda's new AI-powered robot helps sick kids through lengthy hospital treatments – and it’s working

• Haru encourages children to more enthusiastically react to their treatment
• Successful trial in Spain will lead to wider robot rollout
• Honda is looking at ways to expand its empathetic robot line-up

Honda is renowned for its quirky approach to robotics, demonstrating a wide remit of applications that span self-balancing motorcycles to innovative autonomous wheelchairs that can automatically adjust height so users can interact with others at eye-level.

Now it has added an AI-powered carer to that list, which has been introduced to a hospital in Seville, Spain, to help very sick pediatric patients through their treatments.

Dubbed Haru, the 12-inch desktop robot features dual screens, which act as both digital displays and eyes for better human-machine interaction, as well as an LED-infused base that doubles-up as a mouth.

It looks a little bit like a mash-up of a frog and Johnny 5 from legendary sci-fi movies Short Circuit – albeit minus ...