Fanuc, Yaskawa, and THK showcase robots to the public at Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai

By: Yuki Matsukawa, Staff Editor, SEISANZAI Japan

The “Future Creation Robot Week” was held at the WASSE event hall within the Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai venue from July 13 to 19. Unlike a trade show for business professionals, this exhibition was designed for the general public—allowing people of all ages, even those unfamiliar with robotics, to experience and interact with robot technologies firsthand. 

Major Japanese robot manufacturers, including Fanuc and Yaskawa Electric, exhibited and provided hands-on demonstrations. Visitors expressed surprise and delight at the speed of robots in motion and their ability to make autonomous decisions. 

Fanuc: speed competition with parallel-link robot 

Fanuc displayed a parallel-link robot that competed with visitors to pick up tablets and sort them by color into containers. To balance the contest, the robot was tasked with picking up more tablets than the human participant. 

“Occasionally it becomes a close match, but most people are astonished by the robot’s speed,” commented a Fanuc representative. 

Yaskawa: autonomous table-clearing robot and strawberry packer 

Yaskawa Electric showcased its autonomous robot “MOTOMAN NEXT.” The robot demonstrated its ability to clear tables by sorting dishes, leftovers, and paper waste that visitors placed randomly on trays. 

A company representative noted, “We heard comments like ‘The motor sound is so cool’ and ‘I want one in my home’—things we wouldn’t normally hear at a trade show. It was refreshing. One day we hope to develop robots that can be used in ordinary households.” 

Yaskawa also presented a robot that packs strawberries into trays, competing with visitors to see how closely it could match the designated weight while arranging the fruit neatly. 

Visitors said, “I want one at home,” after watching Yaskawa’s table-clearing robot demonstration.

THK: humanoid robot “FRED” 

THK exhibited its humanoid robot “FRED,” which can run at speeds of up to 13.8 km/h—among the fastest in the world for a bipedal robot. Due to space limitations, the demonstration was conducted at a slower pace, but it still attracted strong interest from visitors.