Social Robot - Furhat

Location

Graz University of Technology
SPSC Laboratory
Inffeldgasse 16c
8010 Graz
Austria

Contact

Barbara Schuppler
b.schuppler@tugraz.at
Tel.: +43 (0)316 873 - 4366

Michael Paierl
paierl@tugraz.at
Tel.: +43 (0)316 873 - 4373

Description

The Furhat robot is a social robot developed at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and commercialized by Furhat Robotics. It has been part of the SPSC at Graz University of Technology since 2023.

Furhat is a humanoid robotic bust with a back-projected face displayed on a translucent mask, allowing it to render dynamic facial expressions, lip-syncing, and a wide range of virtual personas, all without any mechanical facial actuators. Its multimodal interaction system combines speech synthesis and recognition (supporting up to 40 languages), computer vision for real-time face tracking of multiple users, and natural head movements, making it one of the most capable platforms for human-robot interaction (HRI) research available today.

At the SPSC, the robot is used to study and develop natural spoken dialogue and interaction between humans and machines. It is not permanently stationed in a fixed lab space, so if you are interested in learning more or trying it out, please get in touch via the contact details above.

Useful Resources

Furhat Documentation

The official documentation provides a comprehensive guide to setting up the robot hardware as well as the development environment, covering both Kotlin (the primary SDK language) and Python via the Realtime API.

Software Development Kit (SDK)

The Furhat SDK includes a free virtual robot that replicates the physical Furhat’s architecture and behaviour. It is the recommended way to prototype and test interaction skills before deploying them on the real hardware.

Furhat on GitHub

The official Furhat GitHub hosts a collection of ready-made skills, example projects, and tutorials that provide a solid starting point for new developers.