I had a chance to get a in person demo of KUBI from @RevolveRobotics and it was pretty awesome. They have a very thoughtful approach to telepresence and evolving video conferencing into a interactive experience using robotics.
Link to indiegogo page: http://www.indiegogo.com/kubi
KUBI solves a problem that I have faced over the last couple of years which is needing a simple but powerful video communication setup that did not take up much space and could be controlled by the user.
I have tried to solve this problem with laptops, tv screens, etc but they all fall short because they lack the ability for a user to control what they are viewing which is very unnatural from a user experience standpoint.
KUBI leverages your iPad which allows you to leverage applications like skype, facetime, etc so your contacts are already built in and it takes up no space at all. KUBI gives control of the video conferencing experience to the viewer by using a robotic arm that is controlled via a simple interface based on a grid system. Through simple taps on the grid interace the user can glance at the whiteboard or focus on each person speaking in the room which makes them feel more involved in the conversation.
There are a ton of applications for KUBI but I would love to see all video conferencing take place with a KUBI like setup.
Hope to get a early version of KUBI soon and test it out for a few days :)
Nice work Marcus and Ilya.