It was launched to much fanfare seven years ago, but it appears Pepper, the friendly humanoid robot, may soon be on the scrapheap.
The $1,790 (£1,290) machine, which is battling to stave off retirement after its maker said last month that production had been 'paused for a while', keeps getting fired from jobs.
It has been sacked from roles at a nursing home, funeral business and bank because people 'expect the intelligence of a human', one expert said of Pepper, which is one of the first humanoid robots able to 'read' emotions.
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Sacked: Pepper the robot (pictured), which is battling to stave off retirement after its maker said last month that production had been 'paused for a while' , keeps getting fired from jobs
It has lost jobs at a nursing home, funeral business (pictured) and bank because people 'expect the intelligence of a human', one expert said of Pepper, which is able to 'read' emotions
Despite the failures, SoftBank Robotics said Pepper still has a number of other jobs, including teaching children, taking temperatures at hospitals and entertaining diners at a cafe in Tokyo
It was billed as a great home companion for elderly people and promoted for use in public places such as railway stations and shops, but never really caught on as a commercially viable product.
Only 27,000 units were ever made, in part due to its hefty price tag, and Japanese conglomerate SoftBank has said it will only start making the 4ft, 62lb robot again 'when it is needed'.
That is unlikely to be anytime soon considering the number of jobs it has been fired from, including reading scripture to mourners.
Nissei Eco Co., a plastics manufacturer with a sideline in the funeral business, hired the child-sized robot, dressed it in Buddhist clergy robes and programmed it to chant scriptures.
But it kept breaking down during practice runs so the company ended its lease of the robot and sent it back to the manufacturer.
Takayuki Furuta, head of the Future Robotics Technology Center at Chiba Institute of Technology, which wasn't involved in Pepper's development, told the Wall Street Journal: 'Because it has the
