Tokyo-based startup Tsubame Industries is developing a four-and-a-half-meter-tall four-wheeled robot that looks like a character from the popular Japanese animated series Gundam, and it can be yours for three million dollars.

Named Archax after the flying dinosaur Archeopteryx, the robot has cockpit monitors that receive images from externally attached cameras, so the pilot can control its arms and legs using joysticks from inside its torso.

It weighs 3,5 tons and has two modes of operation: upright "robotic" and "driving" with a maximum speed of ten kilometers per hour.

The launch is planned for this month's Japan Mobility Show.

"Japan is very good at animation, games, robots and cars, so I thought it would be great if I could create a product that contained all those elements. I wanted to create something that said, ``This is Japan,'' said Tsubame Industries' 25-year-old CEO Ryo Yoshida.

Yoshida hopes to build and sell five robots to wealthy fans, but he also hopes the robot could one day be used for disaster relief or in the space industry.

He became interested in robotics at an early age. He learned to weld in his grandfather's workshop, then founded a company that produces myoelectric hand prostheses. He says he wants to maintain Japan's competitive edge in manufacturing.