A humanoid robot developed by the center plays the drums at the 2025 World Robot Conference in Beijing. [Photo/hangzhou.com.cn]

At the 2025 World Robot Conference held in Beijing from Aug 8 to 12, a humanoid robot music band that was developed by the Hangzhou Humanoid Robot Industry Innovation Center stole the limelight with a live performance.

The achievement, led by Professor Song Wei's team at the center, highlighted the extraordinary breakthroughs that have been made in ultra-light robotic arms, dexterous hands, arm-hand coordination and intelligent music score parsing.

Founded in August 2024 as a joint initiative between Zhejiang University and Hangzhou's Yuhang district government, the center pioneers a university-local government model that integrates research, product development and industrial applications.

By focusing on scenario intelligence, the center seeks to move beyond stability and mechanics, tackling how robots can think and act more like humans.

Applications already span multiple sectors: A jointly developed explosion-proof robot for chemical plants; the nation's first home companion robot equipped with multimodal perception, emotional computing and large-model reasoning; and entertainment-focused projects that fuse AI, robotics and the arts.

"Instead of defining robots by form, we define them by real-world tasks," said Professor Song.

With this approach, the center is building a full innovation chain — from core components to applications — shaping a new ecosystem for China's robot industry.

The Hangzhou center's stand at the 2025 World Robot Conference attracts hordes of visitors. [Photo/hangzhou.com.cn]