CES: Buzzy NEON startup builds ‘artificial humans’ that resemble bankers, fashion models

Figuring out who and what is real or fake nowadays is getting to be a harder challenge in this AI-driven age. At CES, a buzzy startup with a Samsung pedigree, STAR Labs, introduced NEON as its first “artificial human.”

This “computationally created virtual being” sure looks and behaves like people you may come across every day, even if it doesn’tdo a whole lot right now, other than exhibit simple expressions and gestures on a large display. At this early preview stage, NEON is not quite a chatbot or robot and not quite a virtual assistant for your phone. It won’t answer any user questions – yet.

Lifelike projects of display at the NEON booth at CES. (Photo: Robert Hanashiro, USAT)

But while NEON’s can’t be an exact copy or surrogate of an existing human, they are modeled after real people. At CES, NEONs appeared on the wall as yoga instructors, bankers, K-pop stars, news anchors, and fashion models.

NEON is the first venture of STAR Labs, a little known independently run “future factory” of Samsung. CEO Pranav Mistry describes them as a “new kind of life.”

That life is powered by the company’s proprietary technology platform, known as CORE R3, with R3 standing for Reality, Realtime and Responsive. 

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