More than 60 teams will take part in the 2025 International Humanoid Robot Skills Competition, which will be held in Shanghai on May 29.

Participants will compete in 28 skill-based scenarios, including lifting boxes, garbage disposal, loading and unloading bundled boxes, retrieving items from refrigerators, and product scanning, according to the organizer at a press briefing on May 28.

Winning teams for the event on May 29 will be eligible for the competition to be held during this year's World Artificial Intelligence Conference, which is scheduled from July 26 to 28.

Zhong Junhao, secretary-general of Shanghai AI Industry Association, said during the press briefing that economic profits and application in multiple scenarios are the major focuses of developing the robot industry in Shanghai.

"In other words, robots should hopefully do more jobs, whether they are household chores or jobs in factories," he said.

Embodied intelligence should realize the coordination of software and hardware, while robots should also serve the complementary and coordinate functions for human beings. Robots should not be confined to set programs. They should be able to understand instructions made in natural language while prepared with a certain level of reasoning ability, said Zhong.

"As long as robots can understand human beings' language, they can play a bigger role in businesses, industries and families, especially in terms of smart manufacturing, logistics and domestic services," he said.

While humanoid robots are the ultimate goal, there should not be excessive stress on the human shape now as the industry is still at the development stage, said Zhong. Therefore, transition plans can be considered. Wheels can be integrated to facilitate the movement of robots. When the sensor system is not yet perfect, there should be an intermediary solution so that the dexterous robot hand can safely reach the object, he added.