Russian region’s budget delivered by robot. In a suit!

Science & Tech
RUSSIA BEYOND

The governor of the Leningrad Region (near St. Petersburg), Alexander Drozdenko, is forward thinking – or at least that’s how he wants to be perceived. To demonstrate this he enlisted the help of a robot during a meeting with the chairman of the region’s legislative assembly, Sergey Bebenin. The android was dressed in a suit and had dreadlock-like wires sticking out of its head.

“This year we wanted to transfer the budget documents to you not only by web but also with a special envoy!” Drozdenko said. The robot had the region’s budget uploaded into its memory and correctly answered Bebenin’s questions about financial figures.

(The robot appears on 1:22)

Both officials seemed pretty happy. Though it remains unclear if the robot can do anything apart from telling figures (which, to be fair, a simple computer program could do as well) and being so fancy.