It has spent a huge A 300,000 on Chip, a humanoid robot that will be used to carry out research into artificial intelligence for the bank. One of only three REEM robots from Spanish firm PAL Robotics, Chip aims to identify the opportunities and limitations of human-robot interaction, in the hope that the technology will one day become an integral part of improving banking services. Kelly Bayer Rosmarin, group executive, institutional banking and markets, CommBank, commented: "The development of robotics and artificial intelligence will affect all of us in the future. This research will help us better understand the impact social robotics will have on the lives of people, customers and industries across Australia." The bank's innovation lab in Sydney will be used as a testing environment for the research, allowing both students and academics from the country's technology universities to experiment with robotics.