Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.
RO-MAN 2025: 25–29 August 2025, EINDHOVEN, THE NETHERLANDS
CLAWAR 2025: 5–7 September 2025, SHENZHEN, CHINA
ACTUATE 2025: 23–24 September 2025, SAN FRANCISCO
CoRL 2025: 27–30 September 2025, SEOUL
IEEE Humanoids: 30 September–2 October 2025, SEOUL
World Robot Summit: 10–12 October 2025, OSAKA, JAPAN
IROS 2025: 19–25 October 2025, HANGZHOU, CHINA
Enjoy today’s videos!
The First World Humanoid Robot Games Conclude Successfully! Unitree Strikes Four Golds (1500m, 400m, 100m Obstacle, 4×100m Relay).
[ Unitree ]
Steady! PNDbotics Adam has become the only full-size humanoid robot athlete to successfully finish the 100m Obstacle Race at the World Humanoid Robot Games!
[ PNDbotics ]
Introducing Field Foundation Models (FFMs) from FieldAI – a new class of “physics-first” foundation models built specifically for embodied intelligence. Unlike conventional vision or language models retrofitted for robotics, FFMs are designed from the ground up to grapple with uncertainty, risk, and the physical constraints of the real world. This enables safe and reliable robot behaviors when managing scenarios that they have not been trained on, navigating dynamic, unstructured environments without prior maps, GPS, or predefined paths.
[ Field AI ]
Multiply Labs, leveraging Universal Robots’ collaborative robots, has developed a groundbreaking robotic cluster that is fundamentally transforming the manufacturing of life-saving cell and gene therapies. The Multiply Labs solution drives a staggering 74% cost reduction and enables up to 100x more patient doses per square foot of cleanroom.
[ Universal Robots ]
In this video, we put Vulcan V3, the world’s first ambidextrous humanoid robotic hand capable of performing the full American Sign Language (ASL) alphabet, to the ultimate test—side by side with a real human!
[ Hackaday ]
Thanks, Kelvin!
More robots need to have this form factor.
Robotic vacuums are so pervasive now that it’s easy to forget how much of an icon the iRobot Roomba has been.
[ iRobot ]
This is quite possibly the largest robotic hand I’ve ever seen.
[ CAFE Project ] via [ BUILT ]
Modular robots built by Dartmouth researchers are finding their feet outdoors. Engineered to assemble into structures that best suit the task at hand, the robots are pieced together from cube-shaped robotic blocks that combine rigid rods and soft, stretchy strings whose tension can be adjusted to deform the blocks and control their shape.
[ Dartmouth ]
Our quadruped robot X30 has completed extreme-environment missions in Hoh Xil—supporting patrol teams, carrying vital supplies, and protecting fragile ecosystems.
[ DEEP Robotics ]
We propose a base-shaped robot named “koboshi” that moves everyday objects. This koboshi has a spherical surface in contact with the floor, and by moving a weight inside using built-in motors, it can rock up and down, and side to side. By placing everyday items on this koboshi, users can impart new movement to otherwise static objects. The koboshi is equipped with sensors to measure its posture, enabling interaction with users. Additionally, it has communication capabilities, allowing multiple units to communicate with each other.
[ Paper ]
Bi-LAT is the world’s first Vision-Language-Action (VLA) model that integrates bilateral control into imitation learning, enabling robots to adjust force levels based on natural language instructions.
[ Bi-LAT ] to be presented at [ IEEE RO-MAN 2025 ]
Thanks, Masato!
Look at this jaunty little guy!
Although, they very obviously cut the video right before it smashes face first into furniture more than once.
[ Paper ] to be presented at [ 2025 IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robotics ]
This research has been conducted at the Human Centered Robotics Lab at UT Austin. The video shows our latest experimental bipedal robot, dubbed Mercury, which has passive feet. This means that there are no actuated ankles, unlike humans, forcing Mercury to gain balance by dynamically stepping.
[ University of Texas at Austin Human Centered Robotics Lab ]
We put two RIVR delivery robots to work with an autonomous vehicle — showing how Physical AI can handle the full last mile, from warehouse to consumers’ doorsteps.
[ Rivr ]
The KR TITAN ultra is a high-performance industrial robot weighing 4.6 tonnes and capable of handling payloads up to 1.5 tonnes.
[ Kuka ]
CMU MechE’s Ding Zhao and Ph.D. student Yaru Niu describe LocoMan, a robotic assistant they have been developing.
[ Carnegie Mellon University ]
Twenty-two years ago, Silicon Valley executive Henry Evans had a massive stroke that left him mute and paralyzed from the neck down. But that didn’t prevent him from becoming a leading advocate of adaptive robotic tech to help disabled people – or from writing country songs, one letter at a time. Correspondent John Blackstone talks with Evans about his upbeat attitude and unlikely pursuits.
[ CBS News ]
The post “Video Friday: Inaugural World Humanoid Robot Games Held” by Evan Ackerman was published on 08/22/2025 by spectrum.ieee.org