News

City Union Bank's Lakshmi robot promoted from greeter to customer cash custodian

August 24, 2017

Last November, City Union Bank introduced India's first banking robot, Lakshmi, who greets customers entering the branch and answered their questions.

Having proven her worth, Lakshmi is now being entrusted with new duties, according to a report by The Hindu.

The robot is being reprogrammed to accept cash in order to lighten the burden on tellers. Lakshmi is expected to begin her new duties in September.

As described in the report, the process is simple. The robot uses facial recognition technology to identify the customer who then hands over the cash.

Lakshmi deposits the customer's cash into a custom-designed teller cash machine, which counts the currency and sends the customer an SMS to complete the transaction.

CUB plans to program additional capabilities into Lakshmi in the coming months and increase the number of branches using the robot from the current five to approximately 100.