Building the World's First AI Robot Girlfriend? | Somnia CEO Xara

Somnia bets the first humanoid you buy is a companion

Somnia is betting that the first humanoid most people own will be bought for companionship. Loneliness, cheap Chinese hardware and new motion control made an intimacy robot possible, and the doll market proves the demand. Xara built her own body, skin and control stack rather than adapting a doll, arguing intimacy has always been the beachhead for new media. What happens when machines that look human outnumber people is the question she leaves open.

Takeaways

• Somnia's robots move and respond in real time. Xara cites a loneliness epidemic affecting about one in six of the world's 8bn people, and a $10bn doll market growing 20 to 30% a year where nothing moves or responds. She says robots can now look 80 to 90% human.
• The body is purpose-built from skin to muscle. It stands 1.75 metres and weighs 20 kilograms, with 3D-printed TPU muscle parts shaped like real muscles and a silicone and WPU skin layer held at 37 degrees. Its face has 30 degrees of freedom.
• The Chinese supply chain makes the build viable. Somnia is a Cayman Islands American company with no business in China that uses the Chinese supply chain anyway. Xara says the same robot built in San Francisco would take ten times longer and cost twenty times more.
• Preorders open in November, shipping in 2027. The first units go to California, Japan, Germany and the Netherlands, with two robotic brothels planned for Tokyo. The Somniverse will hold six robot series including LGBTQ and anime characters, and Xara is discussing a revenue share with porn star Bonnie Blue.
• Sensors and a stop command enforce safety. Sensors in the private parts and on the back halt the robot, and a spoken command works like a safe word. Data stays local and encrypted, and Xara says Somnia would intervene if a user became addicted.
• Xara calls intimacy technology's usual first application. She says it has always been the first use of new technology, from VHS and the internet to mobile and VR, and cites Xavier Niel and Tencent's Ma Huateng. If Somnia did not build this, someone else would.

From a hacked Unitree to Somnia's own body

1. Xara first tried a robotics data collection business, aiming to be the Scale AI of robot data, and dropped it as too hard.
2. Early work ran on Unitree G1 robots, roughly 40 kilograms and 1.3 metres tall, fitted with a Robo Pussy attachment.
3. A video of a human with the robot circulated on X for two days before it was taken down.
4. Somnia captured 160 sex moves from a porn star in a motion capture suit, then trained reinforcement and imitation policies in simulation. One unified policy runs on the edge.