Would we ever see Robot Office Cleaners? Canon would know first.

If automated commercial cleaning would ever to take off, we would say it would be around 10 years after self driving cars become the norm. Having said this, we do believe commercial cleaning would start with “Autonomation” (See “Autonomation”-Wikipedia -) well before “Automation” becomes the norm. Autonomation is when human and machine work together where automation is when a machine acts alone.

What would “Autonomation” in the commercial cleaning industry look like? If anybody would know, it would be Canon.

Meet “Whiz” by Canon

This advanced vacuum cleaning robot is the closest we’ve seen anybody get to in leveraging technology and robotics in the commercial cleaning sector.

The concept of an automated vacuum cleaner has been around for quite some time now. We’ve seen Roomba’s and Bissels vacuum cleaners, but this vacuum cleaner is in a league of it’s own.

What makes Whiz different?

Beyond doing a great job in vacuuming the floors with a fully operational Hepa Filter to remove 99.95% of particles including pollen, dirt, dust, moisture, bacteria and viruses, there are a few characteristics that make it really stand out.

It’s Easy to Use: Put it programming mode, walk the route you want it to vacuum, and tell it when you want it to run.
It Sees Around Itself: Did somebody leave a suitcase in the way? No problem. It will either avoid it (if the route allows it to), or stop until it’s removed. Same thing applies if it encounters a person.
It Reports on Itself: Did I clean properly? How much cleaning did I perform? Do I have a problem? You will know. Whether it’s a text message or any other type of notification – Whiz tells you what it has done and what’s going on with it.

With the capability of cleaning of up to 4000 sqft per hour and a battery that can run for 3 hours – you can get up to 12000 sqft cleaned in every continuous run.

If you want to do the math – it can save up to 25% time in performing repetitive tasks.

This machine can be useful in many different scenarios. Think about wedding halls, sports venues, retirement homes, hotels and condominiums or other scenarios where one member of the team is a cleaning “Whiz” and the others are cleaning wizards.

Canon offers custom solutions for clients, along with a worry free maintenance program to help ensure a clean environment, along with a pleasant experience for the users.