The 2nd World Humanoid Robot Games, which opened yesterday at Beijing's National Speed Skating Oval, are showcasing more than just athletic prowess. Behind the scenes, a dedicated 5G-A GigaUplink network, built by China Unicom Beijing and Huawei under the 5G Capital initiative, is providing the high-capacity, low-latency connectivity required for the event's complex robotic competitions. This deployment is not only supporting the games but also laying a foundation for humanoid robots to integrate into daily life, with region-wide GigaUplink coverage across Beijing enabling cultural tourism, embodied AI, and Mobile AI applications.
The scale of this year's games underscores the network's importance. With 1,301 competitions across 51 events, involving 2,056 humanoid robots from 666 teams worldwide, the event has nearly doubled in size from its inaugural edition. New high-intensity events like table tennis and kickboxing, along with scenario-based competitions in industrial, hotel, home, and logistics settings, demand millisecond-level responsiveness and high reliability for real-time telemetry, precise control signaling, and multi-robot coordination. To meet these challenges, China Unicom Beijing and Huawei deployed a dedicated 100 MHz network, complemented by a 300 MHz LampSite ultra-wideband indoor system. A dedicated 5QI 7 slice with carrier isolation ensures end-to-end latency stays within 30 milliseconds, enabling precise decision-making and coordination.
Integration with BeiDou RTK positioning provides decimeter-level accuracy, supporting autonomous navigation and obstacle avoidance. On-site tests achieved peak uplink speeds of 1 Gbps with average latency below 30 milliseconds. Beyond robot connectivity, the network prioritizes spectator experiences, dynamically adjusting resources for high-density crowds during admission, waiting, competition, and departure phases. Core services like instant messaging and mobile payments receive stable access, while data-intensive activities like live streaming are accommodated, ensuring seamless interaction even during peak traffic.
The event also debuts China's first embodied AI robot management platform, which assigns a unique network ID to each robot, allowing staff to monitor location, competition status, and operational metrics in real time. Yang Lifan, Deputy General Manager of China Unicom Beijing, emphasized that this deployment is a real-world test that will accumulate valuable assurance experience for large-scale embodied AI deployment. David Li, President of Huawei's Wireless TDD Product Line, highlighted the validation of the 5G-A 100 MHz GigaUplink network based on 3.5 GHz 2CC + 2.1 GHz SUL for embodied AI, and expressed commitment to further strengthening uplink capabilities and spectrum coordination for multimodal device-to-cloud transmission.
This event illustrates that networks are about more than speed; low latency, high reliability, and ubiquitous coverage are equally critical. The 5G Capital initiative continues to push the boundaries of network performance, laying a solid foundation for the Mobile AI era and enabling an intelligent future.
