Bye-bye, bai! This next-gen home-cleaning robot will do all your chores

This Diwali, spring-cleaning will be less back-breaking. All thanks to iRobot's new Roomba 980 that makes a clean sweep of your house, literally, and more. Developed by Puresight Systems, this next-generation home-cleaning robot gets into those tough hard-to-clean corners using adaptive navigation and a new Visual Simultaneous Localisation and Mapping ( vSLAM) technique.

vSLAM sits at the heart of the company's new iAdapt 2.0 Navigation with the visual localization technology that allows Roomba to steer clear of obstacles, while intelligently mopping your floors.

And yes, this one's on the top of its game. A visual sensor (a powerful camera), along with a floor tracking sensor, allows it to sense how far to traverse in any direction. iRobot, which entered Indian homes last year with Puresight Systems, claims vSLAM to be a breakthrough in technology for consumer robotics.


"Indian consumers are constantly looking for convenient solutions to improve their quality of life. iRobot's new home robot will change the way we clean the floors at home," said Ayesha Khan, spokesperson, Puresight Systems.

The basic requirement to run this robot at home is a strong wi-fi connection. The robot comes armed with a wi-fi support and a companion HOME mobile app that lets you to control it from the iRobot's new HOME app.

You can use the app to start and stop the cleaning session remotely as well, while managing your vacuum bot's schedule. If you can't keep track, there's help. The robot keeps a history of all your past cleaning sessions, which is handy when you are not at home. With Roomba, there is also the option of choosing between Android or iOS versions of the iRobot Home app. The new Roomba is significantly more heavier from the other series, due to all the additional hardware inside it.



iRobot claims that Roomba 980 is smart enough to detect different floor surfaces and optimise its cleaning power. It has two 'AeroForce' extractors, the Roomba 880, which lets you do a sweep without traditional brushes, with a removable trash bin and High-Efficiency Particulate Air(HEPA) filters.

The 980 has combination of top camera and a floor sensor which can track where it's been in your home by locating visual landmarks.

At just 3.6 inches tall, the Roomba is designed to fit under most furniture to clean up all the dirt. Roomba houses a new lithium ion battery which provides up to two hours of continuous cleaning.

Priced at Rs 69,990, you might have to juggle your festival budget a bit to fit this new handyman!

It had earlier indroduced the Roomba 600,700 and 800 series vacuuming robots and the Braava 300 series floor-mopping devices for Indian homes. Currently, iRobot has two experience centres and a service centre in Bangalore. The firm is planning to expand to other major cities in the next 12-24 months.