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Keystone
At the prestigious AI summit in New Delhi, the exhibition of a robot dog allegedly developed in India has caused a scandal. The robot named “Orion” turned out to be a commercially available machine from a Chinese manufacturer.
The Indian university, which had presented it at an exhibition as part of the Artificial Intelligence Summit, apologized “for the confusion”. It has since vacated its stand, Galgotias University announced.
The incident caused a great stir, provoked ridicule and a sharp reaction from the Indian opposition. The government had made a fool of itself worldwide, wrote the Congress Party on X.
The exhibition is part of the AI Impact Summit, which is bringing together heads of state and government, top representatives from the tech industry and experts from around the world in the Indian capital this week to discuss the opportunities and risks of AI.
Robots from China
A university lecturer told state broadcaster DD News on the stand that “Orion” had been developed by specialists at the university. The interview with the comments went viral online. Internet users complained that it was actually a product of the Chinese manufacturer Unitree Robotics.
The university initially spoke of a “propaganda campaign” against the institution on social media. It had not built the robot dog and had never claimed to have done so. According to reports in the Indian media, the Expo organizers later asked the university to vacate its stand. Galgotias eventually complied. “One of our representatives at the stand was ill-informed,” it said.