Robots in hotel industry

Thanks to the advent of the new technologies, robots came into being in last few years in several sectors such as medicine, automotive industry, electronic and more recently in hospitality. However, the emergence of robots in hotels remains for the moment a privilege of certain region where the high technology is well-developed like for example in Japan or Silicon Valley. The function of robots is to complete automated tasks and they are used in order to facilitate and improve the work of humans.

Source: https://www.curbed.com/2017/8/25/16201928/robot-hotel-japan-henn-na

Opening its doors in 2015, the Henn Na Hotel in Southwestern Japan bills itself as the world’s first hotel staffed by about 140 robots. Indeed, the visitors will be welcomed by a female receptionist humanoid speaking Japanese who will demonstrate how to check in or a dinosaur as English, Japanese or Korean receptionist.

Since its launch, this new kind of hotel has been a real success therefore the owner decided to open six others in Tokyo and three other ones in Osaka Prefecture by 2018. Moreover, 100 more robot hotels will be implemented in Japan and overseas. According to the Henn Na Hotel owner, there are two mains reasons why

using robots. First of all, it allows to cut the cost and secondly they help to increase the hotel’s efficiency.

Despite these advantages, the robot-as-staff phenomenon may rise some concerns.

Robots are more and more developed and nowadays there is still research made about this industry. Indeed, in the tourism and more in the hotel sector, robots can be an effective help and a good mean to attract new customers.

However, to use robots replacing real staffs, like in the Henn Na Hotel, can lead to a negative effect: robots will never replace human contact and dialogue. Some customers need to meet physically with someone. In addition, there is also a concern about security. Indeed, robots can not maintaining security as humans will do.

And you, have you already tried this kind of hotel? Would you like to go? What do you think about the presence of robots in the hotel?

Source: Barber, M. ; Budin, J. (2017, August 25).

Robot-run Japanese hotel plans world dominance with 100 new locations.
Retrieved from Curbed: https://www.curbed.com/2017/8/25/16201928/robot-hotel-japan-henn-na