Mookkie is a pet bowl that wards off food thieves with AI

A smart cushion that keeps tabs on your furry friend's fitness was all the rage last year, as were robot petsitters, telemedical apps for cats and dogs, and other tech-centric pet accessories. But leave it to Volta, a Milan designer of connected home appliances and industrial apps, to reinvigorate the category with a pet bowl -- Mookkie -- it says is driven by artificial intelligence (AI). Mookkie, which will make its formal debut at the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas next week, features a built-in camera with a fisheye lens, an IR sensor, and an embedded circuit board that automatically detects pets. If a recognizable face -- or muzzle, rather -- comes within range of its sensors, a mechanical panel rotates open to reveal the feed compartment. Better still, Volta says that Mookkie's embedded deep neural network can distinguish between individual pets -- preventing, say, Fido from overfeeding, or a wild animal from stealing your good boy's dinner.