A worldwide competition for the making and operation of robots, RoboCup 2015 opened on 19 July in Hefei City, East China.

This year's event brought together more than 300 teams from 47 countries to showcase the latest robot technologies.

The competition, which ends on 22 July, focuses on three aspects: robot football, service robots and rescue robots.

As the world's largest robot-focused competition, the event also had a special opening ceremony featuring robot technologies. Its interpreting service was undertaken by a robot and two banners used on the occasion were also held by drones.

The RoboCup is not only a competition, but a platform for technicians and science students to learn from each other and transfer the technologies to industrial production, according to one of the event's organisers.

"Speaking from the perspective of industrialisation, as there are so many excellent technologies displayed here and also so many enterprises coming to hold exhibitions and visit, they can easily launch negotiations and co-operation here," said Chen Xiaoping, general chair of the event and president of the Chinese committee of RoboCup.

This year marks the 19th edition of the RoboCup, first held in Japan in 1997.

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