The robot vacuum cleaner market has more and more players every year. The Chinese Roborock once again manages to stand out with a surprising new model, the Saros Z70, equipped with an articulated arm.
It’s difficult to innovate in the small world of vacuum cleaner/washer robots. Suction power is constantly being increased and cleaning techniques are slowly evolving. Here we find extendable mops to pass along the walls, there brushes to dust the baseboards, there again a system for cleaning mops with hot water… Improvements in small touches, more or less useful and more or less mastered . But for this 2025 edition of CES, the Chinese giant Roborock, a specialist in floor maintenance for around ten years, is hitting hard. He has just presented his Saros Z70. This vacuum cleaner/washer robot has, at first glance, nothing really different from its peers. Except that it hides a little surprise under its hood. The device actually has an articulated arm called OminiGrip.
The objective of this device? Lift and move objects that could prevent him from carrying out his mission. So, if a sock or sandal is lying around, the Saros Z70 will identify it and note its location. He will continue his cleaning as if nothing had happened, carefully going around it. At the end of its cycle, it will return to the object then deploy its articulated arm to grab it and clean the area it had to avoid because of the intruder. The arm itself has a camera. The Saros Z70 can thus load objects weighing up to 300 g. Before moving them with his arm articulated on 5 axes, he will be able to assess whether he is capable of doing so. Otherwise, he will leave them there.
Although it may hide an articulated arm in its trunk, the Saros Z70 is nonetheless quite thin with a thickness of 7.98 cm. We also notice that it does not have the usual turret on the top which accommodates the LiDAR, the radar which allows the device to find its way in space. Instead, it relies on 3D sensors and an RGB camera. AI for object recognition is of course there.
The Saros Z70 obviously comes with a docking/recharging station to collect dust, supply it with water and clean its mops with water at 80°C. He can also leave these in the station if he doesn’t need them. As for the robot, it deploys a suction power of 22,000 Pa sufficient to tackle a priori to very thick carpets and rugs.
The Saros Z70 will be launched in the first half of 2025. For the moment, Roborock has not announced any pricing.