Panda Robot Youyou

Youyou is what happens when a national symbol is given legs. UBTech took its large humanoid Walker platform and rebuilt the shell around the shape of a giant panda, commissioning the result specifically for the China Pavilion at the Dubai Expo, where it was billed as the pavilion's ambassador of peace and friendship. Its job there was to walk visitors through the pavilion's panda-ecology scroll and smart-agriculture displays, and to demonstrate Chinese calligraphy and painting. Unusually for UBTech, the full table is public. Youyou stands 130 cm and weighs 63 kg, with 41 degrees of freedom split as six per leg, seven per arm, six per hand and three in the neck. Its servo joints run from 4.5 to 200 Nm and from 30 to 90 rpm. It walks at up to 3 km/h, absorbs 3 cm of unevenness, climbs 15 cm steps and 20-degree slopes, and each arm reaches 600 mm and carries 1.5 kg at full extension. Navigation is quoted at 10 cm localisation and 20 cm path accuracy, tightening to 1 cm for precise positioning. Power comes from a 54.6 V, 10 Ah lithium pack weighing 3.6 kg, giving about two hours of mixed-duty use against a two-hour charge. The compute is a period piece and a useful reminder of how fast this field moves: two Intel Core i7-8665U processors at 1.9 GHz and an NVIDIA GT 1030 with 384 cores, running ROSA on a stack of Ubuntu, Linux with the RT Preempt patch and Android, with Webots for simulation. The face is the point of the machine. Youyou carries twin flexible curved displays behind biomimetic eyes, a four-dimensional light-signal system, and what UBTech describes as a native repertoire of 28-plus robot emotions with proactive interaction meant to build empathy with visitors. Multiple units can be synchronised for group dance routines. The 130 cm, 63 kg, 41-joint figures are identical to those UBTech publishes for Walker X and for Walker S Lite — the same body under three different skins. Youyou was later seen beyond the Expo: it handed the gong mallet to UBTech's chairman at the company's Hong Kong Stock Exchange listing on 29 December 2023.

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