South Korea clears 20 walking humanoid robots from Robros to work beside people at chip, car, shipyard and warehouse sites

South Korea's trade ministry approved a real-world test of 20 mobile humanoid robots made by the Korean start-up Robros on 13 October, at the year's sixth Industrial Convergence Regulatory Special Exemption Review Committee, Financial News and Seoul Economic Daily report. The robots will work at four companies' sites: cleaning semiconductor parts at Nepes, seating car-body parts at Sungwoo Hitech, loading shipbuilding materials at HD Hyundai Samho, and loading refrigerated parcels at Delivery Lab.

Seoul Economic Daily reports that Korea's safety standards for industrial robots assume stationary machines and require safety fences, which has kept humanoids that move among workers off the floor. It says the government intends to use the test data to rewrite the standards. JKN News reports that the approval is conditional on the labour ministry's risk assessment and safety measures, and that five companies, including Robros, applied.

The same committee also cleared, for the first time, four-legged robots to patrol pedestrian paths: Maum AI's robots will patrol riverside walkways and parks in Cheonan, Etoday reports. It says the committee considered 16 items in all.

In a Seoul Economic Daily interview the same day, Robros chief executive Noh Seung-joon said the company has sold 18 of its humanoids so far and plans cumulative output of more than 50 by the end of the year. (Robros's own site spells the robot IGRIS-C; the paper writes Egris-C.) The ministry's own release could not be opened, so every point here is reported.

• Reported The sixth regulatory special exemption committee of 2026 approved 20 Robros humanoids for sites at Nepes, Sungwoo Hitech, HD Hyundai Samho and Delivery Lab. Financial News
• Reported Current Korean industrial-robot safety standards assume stationary machines behind fences; the government intends to use the test data to rewrite them. Seoul Economic Daily
• Reported The test is allowed on condition of the labour ministry's risk assessment and safety measures; five companies including Robros applied. JKN News
• Claimed Robros's chief executive says it has sold 18 humanoids and plans cumulative output of more than 50 by year-end. Seoul Economic Daily