Hate doing laundry? Shin Sakane has a solution.

The Japanese inventor received ¥6 billion ($53 million) from partners, including Panasonic Corp., last month to advance "the Laundroid" — a robot Sakane is developing to not only wash and dry garments, but also sort, fold and neatly arrange them. The refrigerator-size device could eventually fill the roles of washing machine, dryer and clothes drawer in people's homes.

Sakane, whose earlier inventions include an anti-snoring device and golf clubs made of space materials, said the funding will bring closer his dream of liberating humanity from laundry. Among his inspirations for the project is the 1968 Stanley Kubrick sci-fi film classic "2001: A Space Odyssey." Laundroid was designed to resemble the mysterious objects in the film that brought technology to prehistoric humans, and the project was originally code-named "Monolith."