After a typical tennis practice session, a lot of balls are lying on the court. Bending over and picking all of those balls is a tuff deal, but not anymore. According to the creators of Tennibot, this misery will end if their robot reaches production. Tennibot uses computer vision and AI to roam on the court automatically. It locates and sucks up the tennis balls and then stores them in its removable rear bucket.
The Tennibot has a capacity to store 80 balls in its bucket. Apart from using its own sensor to find its way, it also communicates with an included net-post-mounted “Tennibot Station”. Tennibot station has a camera which continuously tracks the location of the robot. If users don’t want the robot to get underfoot while they are practising, they can use an iOS/Android app to configure what part of the court the robot should move in. The app can also be utilized to manually control the device if needed.
The robot moves at 1.4mph and can operate for four to five hours in one charge of 90-minutes. The robot can be lifted at one end by its built-in handle and can be wheeled like a suitcase. It is currently the subject of a Kickstarter campaign. You can get one for $650 with the delivery expected in January 2019. The retail price production will hit $1000.