“Please wear a Medical Mask.”
A crisp reminder came from the “Clumsy Treasure” robot’s “mouth”. Just as a foreigner was about to say hello to him, he was startled by this sudden “reminder” and responded with a “what?”
This is an episode that happened at the Beijing Winter Olympics. “Clumsy Treasure” is a robot responsible for mobile temperature measurement and epidemic prevention supervision on the scene. Most of him is white, with a “tie” around his neck, walking back and forth on the scene, and reminding people not wearing masks.
In life, there are many robots, but it’s not easy to encounter a robot that actively greets you and reminds you to wear a mask like a human. No wonder even foreign friends exclaimed when they encountered it.
As a “Technological Winter Olympics”, in addition to the epidemic prevention robot, the Beijing Winter Olympics also has various service robots such as cooking robots, meal delivery robots, guide robots, delivery robots, and logistics robots, which can be described as a real-life version of “Wall-E”. Even the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) described the smart restaurant at the Winter Olympics as “like a science fiction movie”.
The popularity of the concept of robots has also made people start paying attention to the robot companies behind them. Soon, investors were asking about a certain robot company’s cooperation with the Winter Olympics on the investment interaction platform, showing their enthusiasm.
In the past few years, service robots have always been a hot topic in the capital market. According to the data from Tianyancha, there have been 113 financing events related to service robots in the just-ended 2021, with a total financing amount exceeding 44 billion yuan, far exceeding the financing amount in previous years.
With the Winter Olympics, service robots are expected to further break through. “Jiazi Light Year” has compiled more than 10 types of service robots that appeared on the Winter Olympics venues and the robot companies behind them, let’s take a look at the service robot ecosystem of the Winter Olympics.
01
Chef Robots and Heavenly Delicacies
This year’s smart restaurant at the Winter Olympics covers an area of 5400 square meters, equipped with 120 cooking robots, ready 24 hours a day, and can accommodate more than 1700 people dining at the same time. The intelligent and automated catering equipment in the restaurant was developed and manufactured by Country Garden X’ian Robot Group. X’ian Robot Group, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Country Garden, was established in 2019.
The chef in the smart restaurant is a robot chef—hamburger machine, claypot rice machine, intelligent wok, which can automatically complete the processes of potting, frying, seasoning, and plating through mechanical module control programs and precise control of ingredients ratio and cooking time.
There are no waiters in the smart restaurant, and most of the delicacies come “falling from the sky” and are automatically delivered to the corresponding table through the “cloud track delivery system” above.
To meet the dining habits of domestic and foreign media, the restaurant has carefully designed more than 200 food varieties, divided into 8 sets of menus for cycling. Chinese cuisine is the main focus, with Western cuisine as a supplement, with popular options such as dumplings, Kung Pao chicken, and claypot rice.
It is worth mentioning that the “heavenly delicacies” smart restaurant at the Winter Olympics is not the first of its kind in China. As early as January 2020, Country Garden X’ian Robot had opened a FoodoM robot Chinese restaurant in Guangzhou, equipped with multiple intelligent robot devices.
According to a report from Science and Technology Shanghai, Yan Weixin, a doctoral supervisor and associate researcher at the School of Mechanical and Power Engineering, Shanghai Jiaotong University, is one of the main designers of the smart restaurant. Currently, Yan Weixin’s team has designed more than 60 catering service robots, which can be divided into cooking robots heated by different media such as water, steam, and oil.
In addition to the main restaurant’s cooking robots and delivery robots, there are also leisure catering robots in various areas of the main media. After filling up, you can have some ice cream as a dessert.
In the automatic bar area, the intelligent bartender robot can complete complex mixing operations like a human bartender, perform intelligent shaking actions, and produce a “high-value” cocktail in just 3-5 minutes.
The intelligent coffee machine robot comes from the “Smart Coffee Master” of Hunter Starry Sky, consisting of two six-axis collaborative robotic arms that can complete a series of coffee brewing processes such as bean picking, weighing, water fetching, water heating, and brewing, and even showcase latte art like a coffee master.
02
Epidemic Prevention Mobilization
In addition to the “eating and drinking robots” in the smart restaurant, various epidemic prevention robots are also at the forefront of epidemic prevention at this Winter Olympics, providing solid support for everyone’s eating and drinking.
First, there are “patrol robots” that supervise and patrol. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) Sports Channel once released a video in which a robot was speaking in English to remind foreigners who did not wear masks: “Please wear a Medical Mask.”
This robot named “Clumsy Treasure” is responsible for mobile temperature measurement and epidemic prevention supervision at this Winter Olympics. “Clumsy Treasure” comes from Cangshan, Fuzhou, and is a service robot developed by Fujian Hant Smart Technology Co., Ltd. During patrols, it can detect people within a radius of 5 meters who are not wearing masks and issue reminders to wear masks. It also has a non-contact hand disinfection device on top of its head, which can automatically spray disinfectant through the infrared sensing device on the top of its head.
Currently, there are three “Clumsy Treasure” robots on duty at the “Ice Cube,” responsible for patrolling the athletes’ rest area, audience area, and media area, with a daily patrol area of about 60,000 square meters.
In addition to Clumsy Treasure, Beijing Zhenzhizhi Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd.’s indoor and outdoor universal unmanned patrol robot “Green Wing Bat Mini” is also performing daily patrol duties at the Winter Olympics venues.
The Green Wing Bat Mini can achieve mobile public space patrol, fire door detection, real-time visual detection, mask detection warning, thermal imaging temperature measurement, and continuous publicity. The top of the Green Wing Bat Mini also has a fully automatic sensing spray head, and when needed, the staff can come to the front of the robot to pick up hand disinfectant.
The second type is the disinfection and cleaning robot, which is perhaps the most common epidemic prevention robot at the Winter Olympics venues, with multiple robot companies involved.
The atomization disinfection robot and UV ultraviolet disinfection robot produced by Henan Bokesi Robotics Co., Ltd. are used for disinfection and killing work in the Winter Olympics venues.
The Bokesi atomization disinfection robot is equipped with visual sensors and LiDAR on the chassis, equivalent to two “eyes”. It uses chemical disinfection, can hold 16 liters of disinfectant water at a time, and sprays the liquefied gas from the four-way nozzle on the top into the air. The disinfection area can reach 36 square meters per minute, and a single robot can cover an area of more than 1000 square meters. The endurance time is 4-5 hours, and it will be used for large-scale disinfection work in the Winter Olympics venues.
The Bokesi UV ultraviolet disinfection robot disinfects the area with a 254-nanometer UV wavelength, achieving a very thorough disinfection effect, and will be used for small-scale disinfection work in the core areas of the Winter Olympics venues.
Beijing Luobeide Technology Co., Ltd.’s service robots have covered 12 Winter Olympics-contracted hotels and relevant Olympic venue security units. The service robot operates in a fully automatic, contactless manner, with an 18L disinfectant liquid built-in, a top super-dry mist spray, and can accurately perform precise disinfection instead of manual work.
In addition to disinfection robots, some hotels have also introduced multiple Luobeide delivery robots and intelligent lockers, implementing indoor 24-hour disinfection and contactless delivery in one stop, creating a low-risk, contactless, and safer hotel environment.
In addition to the disinfection robots, Gaosin Robotics’ cleaning robots are responsible for cleaning and disinfecting large public areas such as venue audience areas, media work areas, staff areas, athlete areas, and competition halls at the Winter Olympics venues. This cleaning robot integrates space disinfection, wet mopping and drying, dust removal, sterilization, dust reduction, ultrasonic disinfectant atomization spraying system, and wet mopping floor cleaning functions, while also having automatic charging and maintenance, obstacle avoidance, and other functions.
The third type of epidemic prevention robot is the intelligent security robot. These robots are typically immobile and play a security role.
These robots don’t always look like “robots.” For example, the multi-verification intelligent terminal device developed by Voice Technology looks like a “self-service checkout machine” and is equipped in competition venues and all Olympic-related hotels. Staff only need to scan a QR code on the terminal device at the entrance after presenting an epidemic prevention card, and their personal information, health check status, health report status, vaccine status, itinerary code, nucleic acid test results, vaccination information, and other personal information will be displayed on the terminal device, with the whole process being multi-verified and completed in as fast as 2 seconds for quick passage.
The last type of epidemic prevention robot is the Cloud Image remote ultrasound robot developed by Huada Intelligent Manufacturing, which has been applied to the Olympic Medical Office of Peking University Third Hospital (referred to as “Beiyi San Hospital”) responsible for “contactless” diagnosis.
The remote ultrasound diagnostic system integrates multiple sensor simulation probes, Internet security encryption, high-fidelity low-latency image transmission, high-fault-tolerant audio and video transmission, high-precision robotic arm flexible control, force feedback, and other advanced technologies. Particularly noteworthy is that its robotic arm is a six-degree-of-freedom robotic system with higher horizontal freedom, capable of fully automatic real-time remote ultrasound diagnosis, which can be fully operated remotely by doctors, minimizing patient-side medical operations.
03
Robot Couriers
In addition to epidemic prevention work, the transportation of goods during the preparation and conduct of the Winter Olympics is also essential. The Winter Olympics Organizing Committee has selected several different types of intelligent logistics robots for different scenarios of goods transportation.
JD Logistics is the logistics service provider for this Winter Olympics, and several of JD’s robots and logistics equipment are also being used at the Winter Olympics.
For large items, JD Logistics has dispatched “Outdoor Intelligent Logistics Robots” with a load capacity of 30-300kg, capable of contactless single-end terminal delivery, free movement, autonomous obstacle avoidance, automatic recharging, intelligent path planning, where the staff only needs to place the goods they want to deliver on the top of the logistics robot, and the robot will deliver the goods to the delivery station and unload them according to the preset route.
JD Logistics Robot
For small, non-urgent items, JD Logistics has deployed “Contactless Intelligent Delivery Lockers” to solve the problem of “last-mile” contactless delivery. JD Logistics’ contactless intelligent delivery lockers connect the closed-loop inside and outside the Winter Olympics venues, with double-sided lockers that can store and retrieve items from both sides, achieving bidirectional operation of storage and retrieval. At the same time, the intelligent double-sided locker can also achieve intelligent storage, intelligent retrieval, remote monitoring, information dissemination, and other functions, minimizing direct contact between storage personnel and retrieval personnel.
In addition to JD Logistics, the Candlelight Robot from Candela (Shenzhen) Technological Innovation Co., Ltd. has also become a robot courier at the Winter Olympics.
The Candlelight Robot provides delivery services for stadium staff, athletes, and spectators, including documents, beverages, medicines, clothing, etc. With multiple modal sensors, the Candlelight Robot can actively avoid and bypass obstacles such as people, vehicles, roadside debris in the bustling stadium, and safely and accurately complete the established tasks.
In addition to item delivery, Candela is also providing garbage cleaning, garbage transfer, air disinfection, and other services at the National Stadium.
At the Shangri-La Hotel in Shougang Park, the Number Nine Sugar Delivery Robot has replaced manual labor and become the mainstay of hotel service. The Number Nine Sugar Delivery Robot solves the problem of goods delivery in the hotel, improving operational efficiency through intelligent guidance, customer demand delivery, IoT elevators, intelligent obstacle avoidance, intelligent promotion, 24/7 service, autonomous movement, automatic charging, and from multiple aspects.
The Number Nine Sugar Delivery Robot can intelligently update maps, learn by itself, and upgrade the system through non-perceived OTA. In the same scene, it also supports multi-robot collaboration, distributing robot work as needed through intelligent scheduling.
04
Inside and Outside the Venue
If the above-mentioned robots are mainly responsible for the logistical support of the Winter Olympics, there is another type of robot that is actively participating in the Olympics.
First, there are the torchbearers participating in the Olympic flame relay, led by the Shenyang Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences, jointly developed the underwater torch relay robot with Beijing Institute of Power Machinery, Guangdong Institute of Intelligent Unmanned Systems, and other institutions.
The research team has broken through key technologies such as high-adaptation motion control across ice and water media, dynamic alignment in complex flow field disturbances underwater, precision operations with centimeter-level accuracy underwater manipulator arms, and reliable combustion organization across media, developing the world’s first green and clean water-air cross-medium torch, achieving high-precision underwater docking by the robot.
In addition to the torch relay, there are robots that can participate in the competition.
The hexapod skiing robot developed by a team from Shanghai Jiao Tong University has passed stability control, intelligent perception, planning decision-making, and other tests on beginner and intermediate slopes. This robot, led by Professor Gaofeng of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, was developed by the foot-type robot research team from the School of Mechanical and Power Engineering and the School of Electronic Information and Electrical Engineering at Shanghai Jiao Tong University and received support from the National Key Research and Development Program “Science and Technology Winter Olympics.”
Another robot from a university is the curling robot developed by Harbin Institute of Technology, which uses advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence, image recognition, and automatic control to make up for the lack of curling tactics analysis tools and assist athletes in training.
According to Liu Peng, Dean of the School of Computer Science at Harbin Institute of Technology: “First, we set up cameras on the robot to perceive the state of the venue and the overall situation of the competition; then put the information into a simulation system for deduction, through games and decisions to deduce the strategy of the decision, drive the robot to execute the action.”
At the same time, this robot can play curling games remotely and compete with other robots, effectively enhancing the ornamental and entertainment value of curling sports.
In addition to robots directly participating in the competition, there is also a type of “cheerleader” robot, such as UBTech’s humanoid robot “Wukong”.
In the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Shenzhen, UBTech’s 56 robots wore traditional costumes of 56 ethnic groups, waving flags of the country and Olympic flags, presenting a collective performance. In addition, 9 robots transformed into skiing and skating athletes, demonstrating the aerial skills of snowboarding and skiing.
As products visible and tangible to the public, various service robots have made a strong presence at this Winter Olympics. However, at a higher level, the “technological attributes” of China’s service robot companies still need to be improved.
For example, we still do not have top-notch medical robots, while Intuitive Surgical, a US company, has an absolute dominant position with its surgical robot Da Vinci, with a gross margin close to 70%; and Boston Dynamics’ quadruped robots, there is still a gap between China and the US.
The good news is that China’s service robot industry already has a complete supply chain system and a growing team of engineers, and the recognition of independent brands is on the way from quantitative to qualitative change. For example, in the more segmented field of sweeping robots, companies such as Ecovacs and Stone Technology have grown up to challenge international giants.
In the broader field of service robots such as logistics, cleaning, and medical services, Chinese companies will also follow the pace of intelligent manufacturing and iterate rapidly, and scenarios like the Winter Olympics are not only the athletes’ arena but also the practice ground for all technology companies, including service robots.
Reference:
[1] Inventory | The “Volunteers” of Robots at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics
[2] Winter Olympics’ “Smart Restaurant” popular overseas, see how robots automatically cook, make drinks, serve dishes, and deliver food in the air!
[3] Can service robots from China sweep the world like Chinese home appliances?
