Kawasaki Heavy Industries

Kawasaki Heavy Industries dates from 15 October 1896, when Shozo Kawasaki founded a shipyard in Kobe. Today it is a listed conglomerate (TYO: 7012) headquartered in Tokyo and Kobe with revenue of JPY 1.5 trillion in the year to March 2022, building ships, trains, aircraft parts, motorcycles and industrial robot arms. The humanoid project is a small research line inside Kawasaki Robotics.

Work on bipeds began in 2015. The first Kaleido was shown at iREX in 2017 at 175 cm and 85 kg, doing stand-up motions and pull-ups on a tether. A 2019 version at 178 cm carried its own battery and electronics for stand-alone operation, and 2023 software added real-time footstep correction when balance is disturbed. In 2021 Kawasaki introduced Friends, a slimmer derivative with soft curved styling meant for homes and care settings, with conversation and gesture interaction developed with Osaka University's Nagai laboratory. The newest generation, Kaleido 9, was presented in late 2025.

Kawasaki is candid that this is long-range research. Its own roadmap targets factories and controlled environments around 2030, unstructured environments around 2040 and all tasks around 2050, with near-term use limited to remote-operated hazardous work, patrols, transport and communication support in care. No Kaleido has been sold or deployed with a customer.