The coronavirus crisis has given rise to fresh concerns about automation in labour markets. With people locked down and social distancing still in place, many businesses around the world have scaled up their investment in artificial intelligence (AI). AI's ability to identify and learn from data patterns, and translate them into useful technologies, has proven to be indispensable for many organisations, from healthcare providers to delivery subscription services, for example, in responding to the pandemic. Business applications of AI over the past 12 months have ranged from those designed to increase productivity and yield, through to customer-service functions. Robots have been rolling in to sanitise UK and US hospital corridors and deliver crucial supplies such as blood samples.

We recently chatted with Susanna Dillenbeck, Commercial Partnerships Manager at Furhat Robotics, to learn more about the impact Conversational AI and Social Robots are having on our lives, and their potential for the future. Furhat Robotics is a Stockholm-based startup building the world's most advanced social robotics and conversational AI platform. Hi Susanna, thank you so much for joining us for the RE•WORK Woman in AI Podcast today. I wanted just to firstly ask if you could tell us a bit about the company that you work for, which is Furhat Robotics. It was founded in 2014 I believe. Yes, exactly, so we are a social robotics startup from Sweden originating from the Royal Institute of Technology here in Stockholm, and the company was actually never meant to be a company. So we are the result of the research of our four founders and our current CEO, this was also his PhD project, and it just turned out that the research that we made within social robotics was quite groundbreaking and people from all over the world started reaching out to the group and saying, OK, where can we buy your robot or your prototype? And then the company was born as a demand out of that.

The coronavirus crisis has given rise to fresh concerns about automation in labour markets. With people locked down and social distancing still in place, many businesses around the world have scaled up their investment in artificial intelligence (AI). AI's ability to identify and learn from data patterns, and translate them into useful technologies, has proven to be indispensable for many organisations, from healthcare providers to delivery subscription services, for example, in responding to the pandemic. Business applications of AI over the past 12 months have ranged from those designed to increase productivity and yield, through to customer-service functions. Robots have been rolling in to sanitise UK and US hospital corridors and deliver crucial supplies such as blood samples.

Subconscious bias on the part of potential employers could become a thing of the past, thanks to a'robo-interviewer' currently in development. Tengai, a torso-less robot that speaks and smiles, will judge you purely on your abilities - leaving race, gender and other potentially influencing factors aside. Sweden's largest recruitment company TNG is already using the robot with the human-like interface in a series of trials. Tengai (pictured), the torso-less robot that speaks and smiles, is being trained at Sweden's largest recruitment company TNG to learn to conduct interviews through AI technology. Furhat is a social robot created by Stockholm-based startup Furhat Robotics.

The world's first robot designed to carry out unbiased job interviews is being tested by Swedish recruiters. But can it really do a better job than humans? Measuring 41cm (16in) tall and weighing 35kg (77lbs) she's at eye level as she sits on top of a table directly across from the candidate she's about to interview. Her glowing yellow face tilts slightly to the side. Then she blinks and smiles lightly as she poses her first question: "Have you ever been interviewed by a robot before?"

Eerie lifelike social robot Furhat exudes empathy and warmth, encouraging people to open up more than they do to friends, its creator claims. The robot, a three-dimensional bust with a projection of a human-like face, aims to build on our new-found ease talking to voice assistants like Siri and Alexa. Furhat does this by persuading people to interact with it as if it were a person, picking up on our cues to strike up a rapport. Yet precisely because it isn't human, and is therefore free from bias, the robot can spur people to engage more honestly, its creator says, making it useful in situations such as screening for health risks where people often lie. Furhat is a social robot created by Stockholm-based startup Furhat Robotics.

LONDON – Furhat tilts his or her head, smiles, exudes empathy and warmth, and encourages us to open up. The robot, a 3D bust with a projection of a humanlike face, aims to build on our newfound ease talking to voice assistants like Siri and Alexa, by persuading us to interact with it as if it were a person, picking up on our cues to strike up a rapport. Yet precisely because it isn't human, and is therefore free from bias, the robot can spur people to engage more honestly, its creator says, making it useful in situations such as screening for health risks where people often lie. "We've seen research that shows that in certain situations people are more comfortable opening up and talking about difficult issues with a robot than with a human," said Samer Al Moubayed, chief executive of Furhat Robotics. That's because a robot's personality can mirror the personality of the person interacting with it and because people don't feel judged, he added.

A robot that communicates with humans via facial expressions and understands people by scanning their face has been stumped when it met a person with botox. Furhat Robotics unveiled its'world's most advanced social robotics and conversational artificial intelligence platform' last week. The android can communicate with humans in the way we do with each other - by speaking, listening, showing emotions and reading changes to facial features. The Stockholm-based start-up were left scratching their heads when one test subject completely threw the eerily-lifelike robot. A Furhat insider said: 'We were at a loss as to why one of our robots wasn't interacting properly with a human test subject.

A Stockholm-based startup has developed a talking AI assistant with a face. Furhat combines digital assistant technology akin to Alexa or Siri and humanoid robots like SoftBank's Pepper to create a device that's creepily lifelike. It's essentially a disembodied head that can be customized with different faces - even characters from the sci-fi film Avatar. Furhat is a social robot created by Stockholm-based startup Furhat Robotics. It weighs just over 7lbs and is essentially a disembodied head with a face projected onto it.

Voice assistants have their benefits, but it can be a bit weird to talk to a faceless robot voice all day. Stockholm-based technology startup Furhat Robotics is putting a face to our interactions with AI with Furhat, a social robot that is capable of displaying humanlike expressions and emotions on a customizable face. The company showed off the latest generation of the social robot today at WebSummit. If you took your standard smart speaker and slapped a disembodied head on top of it, you'll get Furhat. The robot uses a projection system to display a pretty lifelike looking face onto a head-shaped display.