Humanoids, factory automation, agricultural bots, and the machines moving into the real world.
59 articles
A new release from the Chinese robot maker points to a shift in how humanoids might learn to react, but the company's autonomy claims have not been independently verified.
The service-robot maker would more than double its early-2024 valuation, though LG says no final decision on a foreign listing has been made.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is asking how roughly 1,000 cars with no manual controls were certified as meeting federal motor-vehicle safety standards, in an inquiry that opened one day after the service went live.
Humanoid robotics is turning into a compute race, and a company that has yet to deploy robots at commercial scale is now betting billions on securing the largest AI training allocations.
The second-generation robot showed off factory skills on the show floor after four months of testing at Xiaomi's electric-vehicle plant, where its nut-fastening success rate climbed from about 90 percent to 98 percent.
The ChatGPT maker is returning to physical machines it abandoned in 2020, saying it will start with data-center and factory workers before home helpers.
Standing under a meter tall and weighing about 13 kilograms, the bot trades human-scale capability for accessibility, and the companion OpenBridge project tries to lower the barrier to entry for teams that want to build embodied AI skills without designing their own hardware.
The public markets have their first pure-play price for robotics software, and the debut values a perception-and-control platform at over HK$12 billion while its largest customers include some of the world's most automated factories. The listing gives the embodied-intelligence thesis a daily trading price, and its revenue growth, margin trajectory and overseas mix will be scrutinized accordingly.
Hugging Face's $399 robot duck Microduck pulled in more than $2.6 million in first-day orders, a figure that positions it among the most successful robot launches on record. The breakout suggests a large market for cheap, failure-tolerant machines trained by a community of hobbyists.
Hyundai CEO Jose Munoz said at the company's August 26 investor day that the automaker is exploring robot sales through its dealer network, with Hyundai Capital studying robot financing and mass production of the Atlas humanoid set to begin soon.
Beijing Humanoid Robot Half-Marathon winner Tiangong Ultra set a 100m time of 9.83 seconds at the inaugural Humanoid Robot Games on August 24, edging past Usain Bolt's 9.58s human world record under event rules and reigniting bipedal-robot debates.
AI robotics startup Sharpa raised more than $670 million in a first disclosed round backed by Alibaba, Meituan, Tencent, and JD.com, as China's dexterous-hand market draws record funding.
Figure AI on August 25 publicly launched Index, a consumer data-collection app with 16 million video uploads, 44,000 weekly active contributors, $15 million paid out so far, and a 12-month commitment of over $1 billion for data and compute.
Beijing's Tiangong Ultra ran the 100 meters in 9.39 seconds on August 23, beating Bolt's 9.58 human record, while Unitree debuted on the Shanghai STAR Market with a 629% IPO premium and 97% of global humanoid shipments now originate in China.
Xpeng's robotics unit raised $900 million on August 24 at a $6.3 billion post-money valuation, led by a consortium of Chinese state-backed investors. The same week, Tesla disclosed it has pushed mass Optimus production from late 2026 to end of 2027, freeing up Fremont capacity for humanoid pilot lines.
Galaxy General Robotics' Galbot ET1 completed 100+ consecutive tennis rallies against former Chinese pro Zheng Jie on August 22 at the Beijing National Speed Skating Oval. In a separate event, Tiangong Ultra ran a 9.39-second 100m, beating the human world record set by Usain Bolt in 2009.
Hyundai Motor Group disclosed on August 21 it will sell its 47.5 percent stake in The Robotics and AI Institute to SoftBank, narrowing its focus to commercializing Atlas through Boston Dynamics. Two days earlier, JPMorgan toured Tesla's Fremont plant and confirmed Model S/X lines are being retooled for humanoid production.
Unitree Robotics closed its August 19 Shanghai STAR Market debut up 460.34 percent, valuing China's first mainland-listed humanoid robot maker at roughly $50 billion. The IPO was more than 8,000 times oversubscribed by retail investors and turned the company's founder into one of China's richest individuals.
BYD on August 8 publicly unveiled the Xiao Di humanoid for dealership customer-facing work. Figure AI has now deployed more than 1,000 humanoid units to paying customers, and Tesla Optimus Gen 3 is in low-volume ramp at Giga Texas. The combined signal: humanoid robotics is crossing from prototype to first commercial deployments.
Unitree priced its Shanghai IPO on August 18 at 150.8 yuan per share, raising 6.1 billion yuan and listing August 19 at roughly 61 billion yuan ($8.6 billion) — the first mainland humanoid robot maker to trade publicly. The conference opens August 20 in Beijing with 300 companies and 2,000 exhibits, and the World Humanoid Robot Games from August 22–26 will test whether the robots can earn their keep.
Unitree Robotics on Monday unveiled its new humanoid 'Superman,' which performs a 2-meter vertical jump from a stand and a 12.66 m/s sprint on 0.85-meter legs — both metrics the company says exceed the standing human world records. Three days later, the company will debut on Shanghai's main board after a 6.1 billion yuan IPO.