Bielefeld team sets off for the RoboCup World Championships

The RoboCup World Championship will be held in Eindhoven in the Netherlands from 17 to 21 July 2024. After successful participation in previous years, the team from Bielefeld University will once again be competing in the @home league. The world championship, which has been held in Bordeaux (France) and Montreal (Canada), attracts 300 teams from 45 countries.

The team from the Faculty of Technology and the Center for Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC) at Bielefeld University is taking part in the championship with the service robot TIAGo (manufacturer: PAL Robotics). The Bielefeld team’s robot has to prove in Eindhoven that it can handle everyday household tasks. ‘For example, TIAGo has to put away the shopping, serve cereals and even put the dishes in the dishwasher,’ says Dr Sven Wachsmuth, one of the two team leaders. The tasks pose complex challenges for the team members: The robot has to grasp objects precisely, categorise them correctly and react flexibly to obstacles.

© Bielefeld University

At the RoboCup in Eindhoven, service robot TIAGo – here in Kassel in April – has to carry out household tasks independently and find its own way around a given space.

Extensive training for the competition

‘Since the beginning of the year, we have been working on realising nine different tasks for the RoboCup,’ reports Leroy Rügemer, co-leader of the team. The team consists of students, tutors, doctoral students and lecturers from the Faculty of Technology. Over the past few months, they have improved TIAGo’s capabilities. Rügemer is optimistic: ‘After our second place at the German Open in April, we are also hoping for international success.’

Global competition in the Open Platform League

The team from Bielefeld University is competing against 18 other teams in the Open Platform League – the league for freely configurable robots. The competition comes from countries including France, Switzerland, Portugal, South Korea and Japan. In addition to Sven Wachsmuth and Leroy Rügemer, the Bielefeld team includes students Zoe Klinger, Mohamed Amine Hammami, Niklas Schmitz, Alexander Esau and Michal Ljubljanac, their tutors Michel Wagemann and Laurin Gräsner as well as research assistants David Leins and Dennis Holzmann.

Sven Wachsmuth emphasises the importance of the competition: ‘The RoboCup drives forward the development of service robots. The knowledge gained is channelled directly into research.’

© Bielefeld University

Members of the Bielefeld University team at the RoboCup German Open in Kassel in April.

[Translation generated with automated support]