How a robot cafe in Tokyo aims to empower – not replace – human workers
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Inventor Kentaro Yoshifuji’s robots allow people to work at the Dawn cafe from anywhere in the world – ‘teleportation’ technology that could open up new demographics for Japan’s flatlining economy. Adam Withnall reports from Tokyo. Japan is running out of workers. With an unemployment rate of just 2.5 per cent, a rapidly ageing population and declining birth rate, finding enough people to fill roles as taxi drivers, baristas and waiters is proving a major challenge to the country’s economy.
![[Customers arriving at Dawn cafe in Tokyo are greeted by an OriHime robot avatar]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/11/15/dawn-front-desk.jpg)
One inventor has created a solution that not only allows disabled people greater access to the workplace, potentially tapping into a hugely underutilised section of the population but could one day let older people keep active even as their bodies age – and stave off loneliness in the process.
![[Yariv and Anat are visiting Tokyo from Israel, and say they found the Dawn cafe concept strange at first]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/11/15/dawn-customers-1.jpg)
At the Dawn cafe in central Toyko, diners are greeted as they come in the door not by a person, but by a robot avatar. It has a friendly voice, two arms with which to gesticulate for emphasis, and a smooth face modelled on a Noh mask from traditional Japanese theatre.
![[Heron and Nallely, software engineers who live in the US, say they could see the concept working in other countries too]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/11/15/dawn-customers.jpg)
Another robot accompanies the diner at their table, taking their order and engaging them in friendly chat about their day or, as is often the case with tourists, their visit to Tokyo. And finally, a third robot brings them their coffee, carrying a tray up to the table.
![[Kentaro Yoshifuji (pictured) says his robots provide a kind of transportation for people who would otherwise not leave their homes]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/11/15/dawn-yoshifuji.jpg)
As would be expected from a country that has been pioneering advances in this field since the 1970s, Japan is home to a number of different robot cafes. But while others utilise high degrees of automation with AI-powered machines functioning like upskilled roombas, things at Dawn are very different.
![[Drinks are transported around the cafe by larger robots, while smaller models at each table take orders and explain the menu]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/11/15/dawn-robot-server-1.jpg)
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