Preferred Robotics and JR East Develop Railway Infrastructure Maintenance Robot
Preferred Robotics and JR East have jointly developed an autonomous robot for railway infrastructure maintenance. This robot utilizes AI and sensors to enable remote track inspection, contributing to worker safety and operational efficiency.
📋 Article Processing Timeline
- 📰 Published: May 9, 2026 at 00:30
- 🔍 Collected: May 8, 2026 at 16:01
- 🤖 AI Analyzed: May 8, 2026 at 16:09 (7 min after Collected)
1. Background and Purpose
Until now, significant effort has been dedicated to maintenance and management operations to ensure the safe and stable operation of railways. Particularly during heavy rains and earthquakes, personnel would patrol along the tracks on foot to visually confirm whether events such as embankment collapses or earth and sand流入 into the tracks, which could disrupt train operations, had occurred. Such work carries the risk of secondary damage, and in recent years, ensuring the safety of personnel due to an increase in bear sightings has also become a challenge. To address these situations, our company and JR East have been engaged in research and development related to remote operation and control of robots, aiming to establish inspection methods that can be performed "from a remote location, such as an office."
Image of the future of infrastructure maintenance aimed at with robots x AI
*The photos are of a product under development and may change upon commercialization.
[Comparison of inspection work]
2. Development Overview
Our company and JR East began development in April 2024, conducting a two-stage Proof of Concept (POC) and performing demonstration experiments on a total of six railway sections, including the Hachiko Line. The robot currently under development autonomously travels on railway tracks and safely navigates based on information obtained from its onboard cameras and various sensors (LiDAR: a sensor that measures distance to surroundings with lasers, GNSS: a system that determines position using satellites) (autonomous track travel). Images and various data acquired during travel are stored within the unit and simultaneously transmitted in real-time to personnel. AI assists in detecting obstacles around the tracks, and the final judgment on the presence or absence of abnormalities that could disrupt train operations is made by personnel in a remote location, such as an office.
Appearance of the prototype unit
Obstacle detection status in demonstration experiments
Top left photo: Obstacle detection test situation, Bottom left photo: Robot-mounted camera footage
Right screen: Data acquired by robot-mounted LiDAR. Objects in the path are recognized as obstacles (displayed in red).
Running様子 (Video *Previous model prototype)
3. Future Plans
Moving forward, we will continue development towards commercialization and plan to conduct running tests on various lines, mainly conventional lines, contributing to improving on-site environments and advancing infrastructure maintenance through the power of technology.
■ About Preferred Robotics, Inc.
Established: November 1, 2021
Location: Otemachi Building, 1-6-1 Otemachi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo
Representative: Tatsuru Isobe, Representative Director CEO
Capital and Business Alliance Partners: Amano Corporation, Asahi Kasei Homes Corporation, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation
Corporate Website: https://www.pfrobotics.jp/
Preferred Robotics is a Japanese robot manufacturer established on November 1, 2021, as a subsidiary of Preferred Networks (PFN). We aim to provide robots that are useful to people by maximizing the use of PFN's strong AI technology. Following the commercial small floor cleaning robot "HAPiiBOT" (released in October 2022), jointly developed with Amano, we launched our self-developed home autonomous delivery robot "Kachaka" in May 2023, and the corporate-focused "Kachaka Pro" in February 2024. We have achieved the No. 1 market share in the domestic AMR (Autonomous Mobile Robot) market, according to the market research report "2026 Edition Domestic Autonomous Mobile Robot Market Analysis" published by Fuji Keizai.
[Related Information] Advanced AI autonomous mobile technology for your site
Our AI and robotics technology, which is also utilized in this project, is a core technology for the small AMR "Kachaka Pro" and the new 100kg payload AMR "Kachaka Evo," and is active in many fields such as manufacturing and healthcare. If you are interested in automating transportation on your site, please also refer to the product materials.
Click here for Kachaka Pro material request
Click here for Kachaka Evo details
[Consultation for New Business / Joint Development]
We are also constantly accepting consultations regarding joint development utilizing our technology, such as this project.
If you are interested in robot development for specific problem-solving or the introduction of autonomous mobile technology, please feel free to contact us using the form below.
Contact us here
Keywords:
Until now, significant effort has been dedicated to maintenance and management operations to ensure the safe and stable operation of railways. Particularly during heavy rains and earthquakes, personnel would patrol along the tracks on foot to visually confirm whether events such as embankment collapses or earth and sand流入 into the tracks, which could disrupt train operations, had occurred. Such work carries the risk of secondary damage, and in recent years, ensuring the safety of personnel due to an increase in bear sightings has also become a challenge. To address these situations, our company and JR East have been engaged in research and development related to remote operation and control of robots, aiming to establish inspection methods that can be performed "from a remote location, such as an office."
Image of the future of infrastructure maintenance aimed at with robots x AI
*The photos are of a product under development and may change upon commercialization.
[Comparison of inspection work]
2. Development Overview
Our company and JR East began development in April 2024, conducting a two-stage Proof of Concept (POC) and performing demonstration experiments on a total of six railway sections, including the Hachiko Line. The robot currently under development autonomously travels on railway tracks and safely navigates based on information obtained from its onboard cameras and various sensors (LiDAR: a sensor that measures distance to surroundings with lasers, GNSS: a system that determines position using satellites) (autonomous track travel). Images and various data acquired during travel are stored within the unit and simultaneously transmitted in real-time to personnel. AI assists in detecting obstacles around the tracks, and the final judgment on the presence or absence of abnormalities that could disrupt train operations is made by personnel in a remote location, such as an office.
Appearance of the prototype unit
Obstacle detection status in demonstration experiments
Top left photo: Obstacle detection test situation, Bottom left photo: Robot-mounted camera footage
Right screen: Data acquired by robot-mounted LiDAR. Objects in the path are recognized as obstacles (displayed in red).
Running様子 (Video *Previous model prototype)
3. Future Plans
Moving forward, we will continue development towards commercialization and plan to conduct running tests on various lines, mainly conventional lines, contributing to improving on-site environments and advancing infrastructure maintenance through the power of technology.
■ About Preferred Robotics, Inc.
Established: November 1, 2021
Location: Otemachi Building, 1-6-1 Otemachi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo
Representative: Tatsuru Isobe, Representative Director CEO
Capital and Business Alliance Partners: Amano Corporation, Asahi Kasei Homes Corporation, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation
Corporate Website: https://www.pfrobotics.jp/
Preferred Robotics is a Japanese robot manufacturer established on November 1, 2021, as a subsidiary of Preferred Networks (PFN). We aim to provide robots that are useful to people by maximizing the use of PFN's strong AI technology. Following the commercial small floor cleaning robot "HAPiiBOT" (released in October 2022), jointly developed with Amano, we launched our self-developed home autonomous delivery robot "Kachaka" in May 2023, and the corporate-focused "Kachaka Pro" in February 2024. We have achieved the No. 1 market share in the domestic AMR (Autonomous Mobile Robot) market, according to the market research report "2026 Edition Domestic Autonomous Mobile Robot Market Analysis" published by Fuji Keizai.
[Related Information] Advanced AI autonomous mobile technology for your site
Our AI and robotics technology, which is also utilized in this project, is a core technology for the small AMR "Kachaka Pro" and the new 100kg payload AMR "Kachaka Evo," and is active in many fields such as manufacturing and healthcare. If you are interested in automating transportation on your site, please also refer to the product materials.
Click here for Kachaka Pro material request
Click here for Kachaka Evo details
[Consultation for New Business / Joint Development]
We are also constantly accepting consultations regarding joint development utilizing our technology, such as this project.
If you are interested in robot development for specific problem-solving or the introduction of autonomous mobile technology, please feel free to contact us using the form below.
Contact us here
Keywords: