Abi Arrives at Her First Senior Living Community in the US

Abi’s First US Home: Eskaton Village Carmichael

Abi is now part of the memory care community at Eskaton Village Carmichael in Northern California - our first US partnership since launching here in March. 

A few weeks in, one example already tells the story. A resident who’d declined to join the group sat at a distance and watched. Three weeks later, he’d pulled his chair into the circle and was asking Abi where she came from. 

That is the work.

Eskaton has spent decades building a reputation for thoughtful care across Northern California. What stood out to us was not just their willingness to try something new, but their clarity about what good care already requires. They don’t see Abi as a gimmick or a labor substitute. They understand that companionship, dignity, and emotional presence are part of care itself. 

What Abi does in memory care

She speaks 90 languages. She remembers prior conversations and picks them back up. She leads tai chi and trivia in group settings. And she sits one-on-one with residents who want to talk - including residents who tell her the same story they told her yesterday, with the same warmth in her response each time.

This is harder than it sounds. Sub-second context-aware conversations across hundreds of residents, sustained over months, is a different engineering problem than task automation. While the rest of the robotics industry is solving for throughput, we’re solving for trust.

The research

Alongside the deployment, Eskaton is partnering with the nursing researchers at the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing at UC Davis on an independent observational study examining how residents, care partners, and family members experience Abi over time. 

The goal is not only to understand Abi’s impact at Eskaton, but also to contribute evidence that can help the broader elder care industry think more clearly about how technology can support aging Americans.

The stakes

American elder care is short-staffed and getting shorter. Two-thirds of facilities say workforce shortages may force them to close. Meanwhile, 28% of Americans over 65 report loneliness, and in care communities, isolation runs deeper than the numbers suggest. 

We don’t think a companion robot solves either crisis. We think a companion robot that residents actually want to spend time with can take real weight off care teams and give residents more of what they came for: presence, conversation, a reason to pull their chair into the circle. 

What’s next

Eskaton is the first in the US. It will not be the last. If you operate a senior living community and you want to talk seriously about what companionship at scale looks like - not as a pilot curiosity, but as a part of how you deliver care - we want to hear from you. 

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