10th March 2014

Table tennis: man vs machine

In 1997, Deep Blue became the first computer to win against a human chess champion, when it defeated Garry Kasparov. In 2011, IBM's Watson competed on the Jeopardy! quiz show against former winners Brad Rutter and Ken Jennings, defeating them both. Now, another competition between man and machine is about to unfold. On Tuesday 11th March, KUKA – a German manufacturer of high-end industrial robots – will open its first plant in Shanghai, China. The opening will be celebrated with a table tennis match between their KR AGILUS robot and Tim Boll, the German champion. This event is intended to demonstrate the speed, precision and flexibility of KUKA's industrial robots. For more information, click here.

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