By Tolu Olufadeju, Nigeria
China on Friday launched the three-day World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing, featuring 280 teams from 16 countries in a bid to highlight its advancements in artificial intelligence and robotics. Participants competed in sports such as track and field and table tennis, alongside robot-specific challenges like sorting medicines, handling materials, and cleaning services. Of the teams, 192 represented universities while 88 came from private enterprises, including Chinese firms Unitree and Fourier Intelligence, with most robots supplied by local manufacturer Booster Robotics.
The event, which charged between 128 and 580 yuan (\$17.83–\$80.77) for tickets, drew enthusiastic crowds who witnessed frequent tumbles during competitions. In football matches, robots often crashed into each other, while others collapsed mid-sprint in running events. Despite these mishaps, some robots managed to right themselves without human assistance, earning applause from spectators. Participants like Germany’s HTWK Robots team said the games offered opportunities to test new approaches in a low-stakes environment before committing to costly product development.
Organisers noted that the competitions provided valuable data for refining robots for practical applications, such as factory work. Football matches, they explained, help train robots’ coordination for potential use in assembly line operations requiring multi-unit collaboration. The games are part of China’s wider push to invest billions in robotics and humanoid technology, partly to address the challenges of an ageing population and to compete with the United States in advanced technologies.
In recent months, China has staged several high-profile robotics events, including what it called the world’s first humanoid robot marathon, a major robotics conference, and the opening of retail stores dedicated to humanoid robots. Analysts at Morgan Stanley have observed growing public interest in such events, noting a sharp increase in attendance at recent robotics conferences, reflecting how the concept of “embodied intelligence” is gaining traction across Chinese society.