China is one of the biggest markets for high-tech products. It imported some 671 billion U.S. dollars of high-tech products last year. Many companies are trying to get a bigger piece of the innovation market in China, and you can find many of them over at the Sci-tech Life venue at the second China International Import Expo (CIIE).
Barely 10 minutes after the venue opened at 9 a.m., a crowd started forming around a life-sized robot called "Roboy." It's developed by a German company Infineon. Unlike many robots, its body is 3D printed and has a set of support and motion systems which are made to mimic the way human skeletal muscles and the nervous system work.
As it turns out, it's an incredibly complicated feat. "The human body is a very complex thing. Think about muscles for instance, it can be very slow and very strong, but it can also be very fast and not so strong. So there are a lot of capabilities that the human body that are difficult to mimic. Technologies in the future is meant to be more human, to have a more natural interaction between the digital world and the real world. For instance, if you have to talk about very personal topics like your medical condition, you do not want to talk to a machine, you really want some interactions. That could be one of the application fields (for Roboy) first," said Helmut Gassel, Chief Marketing Officer of Infineon Technologies.
Roboy hugs people who embraces= it. /CGTN Photo
The expo's organizers said they put a special focus on virtual reality and augmented reality devices this year. There are quite a number of tech companies that make those. For example, Microsoft is showcasing their HoloLens, a so-called "mixed-reality" device.
The exhibition in this pavilion has gotten bigger. Some companies that weren't here in 2018 decided to join this year. For example, Singaporean health product company OSIM.
The second expo is expected to see more debut of new products and new technologies than the first edition. Currently there are more than 30 confirmed new product launches from various companies over the five-day exhibition in this pavilion alone.