The 300 pound R5 Autonomous Data Machine looks like a hybrid of R2-D2 and the robot from Lost in Space. Knightscope, has developed a Robocop-on-wheels, which bears a striking resemblance to the Star Wars’ R2-D2. The mobile robot, known as the K5 Autonomous Data Machine, was created in the wake of Sandy Hook school shooting and has a mission to “cut crime by 50 per cent”

“We founded Knightscope after what happened … you are never going to have an armed officer in every school,” said William Santana Li, a co-founder of the company. The K5 Autonomous Data Machine is intended “to augment private security services on corporate campuses and in large, vacant buildings and warehouses,” according to its developer, Knightscope, which added, “Tedious and monotonous monitoring should be handled by the K5, leaving ‘hands-on’ activities to security personnel.”

The K5′s weapons to fight crime and deter criminals are a “video camera, thermal imaging sensors, a laser range finder, radar, air quality sensors and a microphone.”

All these are intended to alert you should it find anything out-of-the-ordinary as it patrols a “pre-planned route”. Mr. Li envisions the K5 to have wireless access to a data server where it could recognize faces and license plates to identify criminals in the act.

He even goes one-step further into Hollywood fantasy by expressing a desire to employ “precog” – a crime-prediction process […]