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   Sharps Poketomo targets millennial loneliness with a glowing meerkat robot AI   
      
   Date:   
   Wed, 27 Aug 2025 02:00:00 +0000   
      
   Description:   
   Sharps Poketomo is a tiny, emotionally aware AI meerkat offering    
   companionship for young adults.   
      
   FULL STORY   
      
   Japanese consumer tech brand Sharp thinks it has a solution to loneliness   
   among women in their 20s and 30s: an AI-powered meerkat named Poketomo, that   
   glows when its happy and remembers your favorite caf.    
      
   Poketomo is set to arrive this winter (think November or December), providing   
   a pocket-sized companion less than five inches tall and built to chat with    
   you about your day, and remember your shared experiences thanks to Sharps   
   proprietary AI model.    
      
   The belly glows in pastel tones when its excited or comforted. Its head tilts   
   slightly when its thinking. It features a set of basic body movements, all   
   designed to convey emotion. However, the heart of Poketomo lies in the AI   
   model built into the robot for fast responses and utilizes the cloud for more   
   nuanced emotional understanding.    
      
   This isnt the first time a tech company has created a cutesy, non-threatening   
   AI assistant designed to fill social space without being intrusive. But   
   Poketomo might be the most deliberate and fully-realized version of that   
   strategy. You dont interact with it through a screen or keyboard. You carry    
   it like an accessory. You talk to it like a friend. It listens, it learns,    
   and it remembers you. Its designed to be emotionally available and physically   
   adorable.    
      
   Sharp is leaning hard into the concept of empathic AI. Poketomo can    
   supposedly sense emotional cues and use that to initiate conversations based   
   on your mood or recent behavior. Its programmed to offer words of   
   encouragement and support, and then glow softly to let you know its happy you   
   shared something.    
      
   When you dont have the physical device on you, the Poketomo app syncs    
   memories and personality data with the device, so conversations with one    
   carry over to the other. Sharp says you can build your relationship entirely   
   with the app if you prefer, but the physical version is better, and it's what   
   Sharp is betting people will carry, pose with, and form a bond around.   
      
   AI companionship   
      
   Despite seeming like a child's toy, Sharp says Poketomo was designed for    
   young adult women. There's a promotional manga series cementing that fact. It   
   centers around a woman named Nanami in her late 20s, living alone, navigating   
   work and life stress, and finding small moments of joy in conversations with   
   her Poketomo. Even the promotional photos mostly show a young woman with a   
   Poketomo clipped to a stylish handbag, smiling while it talks to her.   
      
   The question is whether this kind of stylized emotional warmth will actually   
   make people feel better about their lives. Will they feel less lonely because   
   of a little robot with some sophisticated response triggers?    
      
   To be fair, it doesnt try to be human, tricking people subconsciously into   
   believing they are talking to a real human, but it might make some   
   uncomfortable. And if the best new idea in consumer AI is make it fuzzy and   
   let it ask how your day was, what does that say about the limits of the tech?   
   I don't think Poketomo will be the cure for loneliness, but it might    
   jumpstart a trend of digital pets able to mimic with emotional depth.   
      
   ======================================================================   
   Link to news story:   
   https://www.techradar.com/ai-platforms-assistants/sharps-poketomo-targets-mill   
   ennial-loneliness-with-a-glowing-meerkat-robot-ai   
      
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