Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries of Korea (MOF) reported the achievements from underwater robotics research project and held a signing ceremony for technology transfer to companies at Underwater robots Test and Evaluation Center (UTEC) of the Korea Institute of Ocean Science & Technology (KIOST) in Pohang, Korea, on 17 January 2019.

MOF and Underwater Construction Robotics R&D Center (UCRC) of KIOST have been working on developing Korean own underwater robotics technologies since 2013. These efforts first culminated in the prototypes of URI-L and URI-T underwater construction robots in 2016, followed by URI-R prototype in 2017. The robots successfully cleared the field performance tests at 500-metre depths underwater in the East Sea on 2 September？29 October 2018.