The 2nd World Humanoid Robot Games opened yesterday at Beijing’s National Speed Skating Oval, also known as the ‘Ice Ribbon.’ As another real-world validation of 5G Capital in robotics and embodied AI, China Unicom Beijing and Huawei have built an integrated digital foundation powered by a 5G-A GigaUplink network, supporting intelligent event operations, robot competition, and spectator experiences. The deployment also lays a connectivity foundation for humanoid robots to move beyond the arena and into everyday life. Across Beijing, 5G Capital’s region-wide GigaUplink network is providing ubiquitous, secure, and reliable connectivity for a growing range of cultural tourism, embodied AI, and Mobile AI applications and events.
China Unicom Beijing and Huawei power the 2nd World Humanoid Robot Games with 5G-A gigauplink
This year’s Games feature major upgrades in both scale and competition design. A total of 1,301 competitions across 51 events will see 2,056 humanoid robots from 666 teams worldwide take part. The number of events has nearly doubled from 26 in the inaugural Games to 51 this year, with new high-intensity head-to-head events such as table tennis and kickboxing. Scenario-based competitions have also expanded into real-world settings including industrial production, hotels, homes, and logistics, while dance events place greater emphasis on synchronised movement across multiple robots. More autonomous competition formats and significantly higher task complexity are placing stringent demands on networks for high-capacity uplink, millisecond-level responsiveness, and high reliability, supporting real-time robot telemetry, precise control signalling, and multi-robot coordination.
To meet these requirements, China Unicom Beijing and Huawei deployed a dedicated 100MHz network, complemented by a 300MHz LampSite ultra-wideband indoor network, to support real-time robot telemetry and precise signalling exchange. A dedicated 5QI 7 slice combined with carrier isolation keeps end-to-end latency for humanoid robots within 30 milliseconds, supporting millisecond-level decision-making and response while helping ensure the precision of multi-robot coordination, obstacle avoidance, and fine-motion control.
By further integrating the dedicated network with BeiDou RTK (Real-Time Kinematic) positioning, the solution delivers decimetre- to sub-decimetre-level positioning accuracy, supporting autonomous navigation, agile obstacle avoidance, and precision racing in complex environments. On-site tests recorded a peak uplink speed of 1Gbps, with average latency below 30 milliseconds.
While safeguarding mission-critical connectivity for the robots, China Unicom has also made the network experience of on-site spectators a priority. To address the high-density, heavy traffic demands of large crowds, network resources and service assurance policies are dynamically adjusted according to different phases and areas of the event, including admission, waiting, competition, and departure. Core services such as instant messaging, ticket inquiries, QR-code admission, and mobile payments are prioritised for stable access, while the network also accommodates data-intensive services such as photo uploads, short-video sharing, and live streaming. This allows spectators to stay connected, interact seamlessly, and share highlights in real time even during peak traffic periods.
On the operations side, China Unicom has also developed China’s first embodied AI robot management platform designed for event scenarios. Through a unique network ID assigned to each robot, event staff can monitor its location within the venue, competition status, and operational metrics in real time, creating a closed-loop operations and management system.
China Unicom and Huawei together advancing the 5G capital initiative
Yang Lifan, Deputy General Manager of China Unicom Beijing, said: “This network deployment is not only a real-world test of China Unicom’s network capabilities; it will also help us accumulate valuable network assurance experience for the large-scale deployment of embodied AI. China Unicom will continue to build on the experience gained through the 5G Capital initiative and turn technological innovation into tangible and replicable network capabilities for the Mobile AI era. In doing so, we aim to support industrial innovation and help bring Chinese solutions to the world with China Unicom’s expertise.”
David Li, President of Huawei’s Wireless TDD Product Line, said: “The 2nd World Humanoid Robot Games have provided a compelling real-world validation of the 5G-A 100MHz GigaUplink network based on 3.5GHz 2CC + 2.1GHz SUL for embodied AI scenarios. Looking ahead, Huawei will continue to work with China Unicom Beijing to strengthen uplink capabilities and advance spectrum coordination, building multidimensional network capabilities with tiered and differentiated service assurance for multimodal device-to-cloud transmission. This will enable real-time interaction and precise control across a wide range of embodied AI scenarios.
“Networks are about more than speed. Low latency, high reliability, and ubiquitous coverage are equally important. Building on these capabilities, we will further advance the 5G Capital initiative, continue to expand the boundaries of network performance, and lay a solid foundation for the Mobile AI era, working with industry partners to enable an intelligent future.”
There’s plenty of other editorial on our sister site, Electronic Specifier! Or you can always join in the conversation by commenting below or visiting our LinkedIn page.
