By Melisa Ng | Aug 25, 2009

The Dirt-Eating Robot – picaBot!

What makes picaBot different from all the other floor cleaning robots is the story behind its existence.

After more than 10 years of having a fair share of problems with live-in house maids, Vanessa Tho decided to live without one eventually. However, being a professional lady with two young children, a great deal of house work awaited her whenever she came home. She learnt to make good use of modern technologies to help with her house chores. After discovering the existence of robotic vacuum cleaners and recognised its market potential 4 years ago, the company she co-founded with several friends searched far and wide for a suitable one. They ended up having to use more than 20 different models of robotic floor cleaners from different suppliers all over the world and came up with a score card for each. A model from Metapo Inc in the US stands out clearly in terms of performance/ price index.

A few more brainstorming sessions saw the birth of the brand name ‘picaBot’. The word ‘pica’ refers to an eating disorder which is a craving for substances that are non-nutritive such as clay, dirt, and soil. True to its name, picaBot will not spare any dust or dirt in its path.

Versatile and Competent in Every Way
By choosing picaBot, you can free yourself from the boring task of vacuuming and devote your time to more important activities like preparing the day’s meals or tending to your family.

picaBot is efficient, intelligent and affordable. It has the ability to navigate its way around the floor in various patterns including spiral, along-the wall, straight line, polygonal or S-shape. It moves randomly, turning on every bump and wall it encounters, eventually covering the entire room given enough time. With an overall height of only 9cm, not only does it clean around furniture without knocking or bumping into them, it goes under them too! It is very versatile and with an improved suspension system, it is able to clean almost any surface from carpets to tiles, laminated and wooden floors. It can run from 70 to 100 minutes depending on the surface and set up of the area.

Vanessa Tho - the lady behind picaBot

Through extensive research and development, Corvan Technology made further improvements by making picaBot among the world's first robotic floor cleaners equipped with nanotech floor sterilizing system. The trick is to treat the UV tube mounted on the underside of the robot with a layer of Nano meter-sized titanium dioxide (TiO2), a technology called photocatalysis. During operation, the photocatalytic UV tube eliminates germs, bacteria, viruses and dust mites on the floor. picaBot also has a special compartment where you can put any solid block of wood, sponge or anything that can absorb the smell/aroma of your preferred essential oils or fragrance. So not only will you have a clean house but also an aromatic one too!

It has sensors that would prevent it from falling down the stairs and edges more than 4cm depth. Isn’t this autonomous robot intelligent? It also has a soft-touch movement which keeps your furniture scratch-free. Being an environmentally friendly product, picaBot uses only 24Wh of electricity per hour while a manual vacuum cleaner uses anything from 800Wh to 2500Wh of electricity per hour. picaBot also has a re-usable dust box with a special electrostatic filter. This eliminates the use of disposable dust bag and minimises your exposure to flying dust when clearing the collected dust as they are fully washable.

It uses a wall-following sensor to return to the charging base to recharge automatically upon completion of its job or when the battery level is low (it takes about 2 ½ hours for a full recharge). An ultra-slim remote control gives you full control of the robot and it fits nicely on a recess at the cover of the robot so you need not worry about losing or misplacing it.

A Notch above the Other Robots
picaBot is no ordinary gadget and is best known for its simplicity and a notch above any household cleaning items you may have seen before. It is user-friendly and manageable that even young children can use it on their own without supervision!

General Manager of Corvan Technology, Mr. Kevin Lee said “Getting to know how picaBot works and behave is important. The best way is to imagine the robot as being blind and can’t remember although its movement is guided with touch sensors and robotic intelligence.” However simple to operate, you still need to get to know it to become part of your life.

Another advantage is Corvan Technology has a complete service facility in its service center in Petaling Jaya providing quick turnaround time of not more than 3 days for any service requirement. There are also customer service agents at particular states in Terengganu, Kelantan, Pahang, Penang and Negeri Sembilan.

The picaBot which initially sells at RM 1788 is now available at a promotional price of RM1488 while stocks last. Your personal picaBot comes with a 1-year warranty for the robot and 6 months for the battery. The retail package includes a battery, 2 filters, a hand brush, a recharging base, a power adapter, an instruction manual and a quick start guide.

• Advocating Wet Cleaning

	Corvan Technology Sdn Bhd
	(603) 7805 1866 / 7728 1866
	enquiry@corvan.com.my
	15-1(GF), Jalan PJU1/3D, 47301, Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia.