Its engineers focus on embodied intelligence, which is artificial intelligence that controls a physical robot body<\/a>, so these machines can handle messy, real-world environments.<\/p>\n Fangchenggang is a coastal city in Guangxi near the border with Vietnam, where cargo trucks, coaches, and day travelers constantly cycle through.<\/p>\n Chinese planners see a border crossing as a tough, real-world test, because schedules are tight and inspections cannot easily stop.<\/p>\n If these robots perform reliably there, it will be easier to argue for similar deployments at airports, seaports, and crowded train stations.<\/p>\n Inside the Walker S2 robots<\/p>\n Walker S2 is an adult-sized humanoid machine with jointed legs, a torso, and arms, designed to move wherever people already walk.<\/p>\n It uses autonomous battery swapping, which involves robots<\/a> changing battery packs without human help, so that it can work with very little downtime.<\/p>\n To stay balanced and avoid collisions, the robot combines cameras, depth sensors, and force feedback in its joints to monitor nearby movement.<\/p>\n That mix of hardware and software makes Walker S2 closer to a general purpose worker than many single-task factory machines.<\/p>\n What Walker S2 units can do<\/p>\n At the Fangchenggang project, Walker S2 units will help border staff guide passenger queues, direct vehicles, and answer simple questions from travelers.<\/p>\n Some robots will patrol corridors and waiting areas, watching for blocked exits or crowd patterns that might require human officers to intervene.<\/p>\n Others will move between cargo lanes to support logistics teams, checking container IDs, confirming seals, and relaying status updates to dispatch centers.<\/p>\n Away from the border itself, the fleet is expected to inspect steel, copper, and aluminum facilities, walking structured routes through hot industrial yards.<\/p>\n Walker S2 units are popular<\/p>\n The Fangchenggang order is not UBTECH\u2019s first big humanoid contract; earlier deals in 2025 covered factories and data centers in other provinces.<\/p>\n \u201cThis isn\u2019t just a number; it\u2019s proof of real-world value and the accelerating commercialization of humanoid robots globally!\u201d wrote scientists at UBTECH in a post<\/a>.<\/p>\n Including the September procurement deal and domestic projects, UBTECH says 2025 orders for the Walker S2 series now total around $157 billion.<\/p>\n Yet the company remains loss-making, even as revenue grows, and must convince investors that these orders will turn into sustainable profit.<\/p>\n Policy moves behind border trial<\/p>\n In 2023, China\u2019s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued guidance calling for a national innovation system around humanoid robots by 2025.<\/p>\n The ministry opened consultation in 2024 on a standardization technical committee<\/a>, an expert group that writes industry rules for humanoid robots.\u00a0<\/p>\n Chinese officials treat humanoid robots as a strategic industry, inviting company leaders onto national standard writing bodies that will review deployments like Fangchenggang.<\/p>\n This border trial fits that agenda, putting humanoids<\/a> into a regulated space where safety, reliability, and accountability will be watched closely by regulators.<\/p>\n Training the humanoid robots<\/p>\n Beijing has opened a humanoid robot data training center, where robots practice tasks to collect training data in Shijingshan District.<\/p>\n The site covers about 3,000 square meters, roughly 32,000 square feet, and already deploys more than 100 humanoid machines in staged workplaces.<\/p>\n For training, robots there assemble parts in mock workshops, clean bathrooms, make beds, and even tend plants and small indoor gardens.<\/p>\n A center like this gives developers data, so future humanoids<\/a> arrive at places like Fangchenggang with tested skills instead of guesswork.<\/p>\n A recent survey<\/a> of industrial robotics research found that perception systems are critical when machines and human workers share the same space.\u00a0<\/p>\n In that work, researchers highlight how cameras, depth sensors, and other detectors let robots recognize people, avoid collisions, and adjust speed near crowds.<\/p>\n Those capabilities line up with the Fangchenggang plans, where humanoids<\/a> will follow patrol routes yet respond to unexpected human movements in real time.<\/p>\n Researchers also warn that safety is never automatic, so systems must be tested carefully and monitored continuously when robots operate close to people.<\/p>\n What this means for real humans<\/p>\n For travelers, the most visible change will be sharing lines and inspection halls with machines that can talk, point, and give basic directions.<\/p>\n Border officers may spend less time managing queues or repeating simple instructions, and more time on identity checks, risk assessments, and complex investigations.<\/p>\n Some people will welcome shorter waits and clearer information, while others may feel uneasy seeing humanoid robots<\/a> watching movements and recording every interaction.<\/p>\n For border staff, the rollout raises practical questions about training, authority, and responsibility whenever a robot makes a mistake or misses signals.<\/p>\n Questions remain about Walker S2<\/p>\n The Fangchenggang deployment will test whether humanoids can keep their balance, avoid glitches, and handle messy weather at an outdoor, high-traffic crossing.<\/p>\n It will also show whether continuous robot patrols and inspections save money once equipment costs, software development, maintenance, and supervision are fully counted.<\/p>\n China\u2019s economic planners have already warned humanoid robot<\/a> firms against overpromising and overbuilding. This reflects their concerns about hype and potential overcapacity in the sector.<\/p>\n If the trial succeeds, future deployments might extend to other borders and critical infrastructure, but if it fails, companies could face tougher scrutiny.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Details obtained from an online post<\/a> by Interesting Engineering.<\/p>\n \u2014\u2013<\/p>\n Like what you read? Subscribe to our newsletter<\/a> for engaging articles, exclusive content, and the latest updates.<\/p>\n Check us out on EarthSnap<\/a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls<\/a> and Earth.com.<\/p>\n \u2014\u2013<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"China is about to send humanoid robots to work at a busy border with Vietnam. UBTECH Robotics has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":369643,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[256,254,255,64,63,128,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-369642","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-au","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/369643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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