Acapela Gives a Voice to Airport Assistant

Japan's Kyoei Group and AI have turned to Acapela Group to provide its U.S. English synthetic voice Sharon to Kokoro, a humanoid robot that is currently being tested at Narita Airport.

Kokoro will be the first robot in Japan to provide assistance at an airport insurance counter. It speaks both Japanese and English, using AITalk by AI for the Japanese and Acapela TTS for the English voice.

The humanoid will guide passengers on their way in Terminal 1 and inform them about overseas insurance procedures and registration, important notices, medical and health information, flight and departure gates, and more.

Kokoro looks very human, moves its head, bows, blinks, and talks with a highly natural voice and can engage in a full conversation.

The test will run through May 8.