The Nippon Robotic Baseball (NRB) League

The NRB is not quite yet reality, but given the accomplishments by Japanese researchers, Japan could be the first country to field such an endeavor.

The Associated Press reported that a Japanese researcher at the University of Tokyo, Masatoshi Ishikawa and his team have developed a baseball batting robot that works for balls thrown to it at slow speeds, but with great accuracy. It can bat the balls into a basket at a desired location.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/24/AR2009072401104.html

A pitching robot throws a ball made of polystyrene against a batting robot, right, during a demonstration at University of Tokyo in Tokyo, Japan, Friday, July 24, 2009. The both robots have been developed by Information Science Technology Prof. Masatoshi Ishikawa. The pitching robot can throw 40 kph (25mph) strike balls at one-meter (3 feet 3 inches) by 0.8-meter (2 feet 6 inches) strike zone set at 3.5-meter (11 feet 5 inches) away with almost 100 percent accuracy and the batting robot can hit them with more than 90 percent accuracy if hey were thrown in to the strike zone.


Japanese professor creates baseball-playing robots
The Associated Press Friday, July 24, 2009 7:47 AM

TOKYO -- Look out Ichiro Suzuki and Daisuke Matsuzaka. A pair of baseball-playing robots that can pitch and hit with incredible results have been developed in Japan.

The pitching robot, with its three-fingered hand, can throw 90 percent of its pitches in the strike zone, won't need any relief from the bullpen and never asks for a pay rise.

The batting robot, which has a sensor to determine if pitches are strikes or balls, hits balls in the strike zone almost 100 percent of the time, doesn't swing at pitches outside the strike zone, and is guaranteed to pass all drug tests.

The two robots were created by University of Tokyo professor Masatoshi Ishikawa.

"The demand level of the robotics technology of each robot is very high," Ishikawa said. "What was difficult was to create a mechanism to satisfy such a high level of demand."

The pitching robot throws a plastic foam ball at 40 kilometers per hour (25 mph), but Ishikawa is hoping to increase the speed to 150 kph (93 mph) and make it able to throw off-speed pitches like curves and sliders.

Ishikawa is also working on getting the batting robot to be able to hit to all parts of the field.

The robots don't resemble humans but instead the type of robots on a car assembly line.

Japan boasts one of the leading robotics industries in the world, and the government is pushing to develop the industry as a road to growth. Automaker Honda has developed the child-sized Asimo, which can walk and talk.

Another Japanese researcher down at Hiroshima University, Dr. Idaku Ishii has already developed a robot able to hit a pitch coming at speeds up to 300 kilometers per hour ...

http://www.engadget.com/2005/06/06/japanese-baseball-robot-can-hit-a-300km-h-pitch-whut

Japanese baseball robot can hit a 300km/h pitch, whut?

by Barb Dybwad, posted Jun 6th 2005 at 6:05AM


Hiroshima University associate professor Idaku Ishii has developed a robot able to cope with some serious fastball action, able to hit a pitch coming at speeds up to 300 kilometers per hour. We're pretty impressed with this, considering we routinely strike out during heated Engadget Whiffle Ball matches. The robot manages such uber-skilldom by instantly analyzing the imaging results from its precision cameras to determine the balls' trajectory, then whammo, socking the living daylights out of it (that's the technical terminoloy, honest). All of which is part of a plan to replace all humans in the sport of baseball with either mechanoids or cartoons, saving the industry millions in salaries and legal fees.

ICHIRO SPARKS CURRY FOR BREAKFAST BOOM BACK IN JAPAN

How a single 2008 New Year's documentary clip of Ichiro Suzuki helped spark a "curry for breakfast" boom in Japan ...


http://www.nni.nikkei.co.jp/e/fr/tnks/Nni20090619D19JF062.htm

Friday, June 19, 2009
Curry, The New Breakfast Staple

House Foods profits by pinpointing, expanding tiny social trend

By Kosuke Iwano

House Foods' House Asa-Curry became an instant hit as a packaged breakfast product, quickly selling out after it hit store shelves in February. It spawned a continuing trend in Japan.


Over the past couple of years, curry has gone from being a novel item on the breakfast table to establishing itself as a breakfast staple. House Foods Corp.'s House Asa-Curry is largely responsible for the trend. The company released the ready-made curry meal after spending a year on product development.

What was the secret to transforming a small trend into a mainstream one? Taking advantage of a small social phenomenon with smart marketing.

House Asa-Curry comes in two varieties: Medium Hot and Yasai Keema Medium Hot. One package holds two 75-gram curry pouches, a perfect size to pour over a bowl of rice. A package is priced at around Y198 ($2.04). Soon after House Foods released the curry on Feb. 26, it sold out, and is now taking a bite out of the market share of leading brands Bon Curry by Otsuka Foods Co. and House Foods' own Curry Marche.

New curry concepts

"While contemplating the next curry product, the company's product developer noticed a TV show on baseball star Ichiro Suzuki that aired on New Year's Day in 2008. The special showed Ichiro eating the homemade curry his wife prepares for him every morning before he goes to work as a Major League Baseball player. The word "morning" stood out in the product developer's head."

Baseball star Ichiro Suzuki gets his morning lift from curry breakfasts prepared by his wife. Foodmakers and consumers took notice.

House Foods, the largest curry seller in the country, has always been aggressive about developing new curry concepts, from white curry to curry served in a pot.

While contemplating the next curry product, the company's product developer noticed a TV show on baseball star Ichiro Suzuki that aired on New Year's Day in 2008. The special showed Ichiro eating the homemade curry his wife prepares for him every morning before he goes to work as a Major League Baseball player. The word "morning" stood out in the product developer's head.

A quick search on NTT Data Lifescape Marketing Corp.'s Shoku-Map revealed that breakfast curry was on the rise. Having curry for breakfast is not all that unusual, but luckily, Ichiro's morning curry story got picked up by the mass media. House Foods product developers realized they were onto something and sensed that the floundering market for pouch curry was about to turn around.

One of the first things researchers looked into was the average time people spent on breakfast regardless of generation or age. Their finding: 10 minutes. That meant heating time needed to be reduced. But curry pouches use animal fat and without heat, the curry gets too thick. Manufacturers decided to use vegetable oil with a low melting point so that all it needed was a warm bed of rice.

To keep the curry light on the stomach, wheat content was reduced, while vegetable fiber was increased to give the meal some weight. Ingredients were cut up into small bite-size pieces.

For marketing and promotional purposes, the target consumer was the family. For a whole month after the day before the product's release, commercials were aired relentlessly in the morning to reach TV-viewing mothers.

Masahiro Tanaka, a starting pitcher for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles of Nippon Professional Baseball, was hired as a spokesman to convey the product's image of strength and toughness.

The plan worked. Pouched curry is usually considered a meal for single people, but it is also popular with families and young couples, according to officials at Daiei Inc.'s Ichikawa Colton Plaza outlet, a supermarket in Chiba Prefecture. The curry was unveiled during exam season, and it was around that time that people took notice of an essay discussing how curry's beneficial effects on blood flow in the brain help boost concentration. Mothers who had children taking exams started feeding them more curry.

The breakfast angle is not really new - consider canned coffee - but the company succeeded at identifying a latent demand, giving a product a new twist - in this case, a place on the breakfast table - and breathing new life into it.

Already part of the diet

House Foods's hit concept can be found in many train stations in Japan. Curry Shop C&C is managed by Restaurant Keio Co., a subsidiary of Keio Corp. It added morning curry to its menu in 1998, and the meal has been popular with businessmen in their 30s and older. Sales at the restaurant have been climbing in recent years.

Curry guru Prof. Tei of Nihon Pharmaceutical University has actively spread his scientific findings that curry enhances brain power.

Curry is a dish most commonly ordered during lunch or dinner at restaurants. The Curry Shop had tried offering curry as part of its breakfast menu earlier, but the response was tepid. However, when the shop began offering a special curry it had developed for breakfast, the response was positive. The portion is smaller and comes in two toppings: sausage priced at Y370 and omelet at Y400, both cheaper than the regular pork curry at Y430.

The morning curry is offered until 11 a.m. The regular menu is also available, but at the busiest Shinsen Shinjuku store, 80% of its customers order the morning curry. At the 10 stores that offer morning curry, an average of 70% order it. The curry accounts for an average of 5% of total sales for all 10 outlets.

Why curry in the morning? A survey conducted in September 2008 by Asahi Soft Drinks Co. of office workers in their 20s and 30s may provide some clues. The survey was conducted to get a clear picture of how today's businessmen spend their mornings.

When asked how their daily routines have changed since two to three years ago, about 40% responded that they were doing more in the mornings. About 53% said they eat out for breakfast and spend an average of Y338 on breakfast.

The decline in economic conditions has forced companies to reduce overtime, encouraging office workers to make better use of their mornings. That meant people wanted a more substantial breakfast, but one that can be consumed quickly.

Prof. Munetetsu Tei of Nihon Pharmaceutical University, a specialist in Eastern medicine, is the man behind House Foods' Asa-Curry. In clinical studies, he confirmed that curry improved blood flow in the brain and strengthened one's ability to concentrate. He has been singing curry's praises for 10 years.

Tei himself is a big curry fan and critic. When he steps into a curry shop, restaurant owners go on high alert. He makes his own curry spices from scratch, and during his days as an assistant professor at the University of Tokyo, he discovered that after a curry meal, blood flow in the brain increased 2-4%. This, he found, was due to cardamon, a spice commonly used to add aroma.

(The Nikkei Weekly June 8 issue)