Humanoid Robots in 2026: Unitree's IPO and the Race to Make Robots Useful
Humanoid Robots in 2026: Unitree's IPO and the Race to Make Robots Useful
摘要: Humanoid Robots in 2026: Unitree’s IPO, China’s Lead and the Race to Make Robots Useful
Tim Harper
/
21 August 2026
Research cut-off: 21 Augus
正文
Humanoid Robots in 2026: Unitree’s IPO, China’s Lead and the Race to Make Robots Useful
Tim Harper
/
21 August 2026
Research cut-off: 21 August 2026.
Unitree Robotics arrived on Shanghai’s STAR Market on 19 August with
the sort of debut that normally ends serious discussion. The company
sold 40.45 million new shares at RMB150.80, raised about RMB6.1 billion
(US$904 million), opened at RMB1,100 and closed at RMB845. That was a
460% first-day gain and a closing market capitalisation of RMB341.77
billion, close to US$50 billion. The retail tranche was 5,526 times
subscribed after final allocation. (
prospectus
SSE/Xinhua
Finance first-day data
Associated
The debut captured a market approaching an inflection point. Robot
bodies are becoming cheaper and more capable, manufacturing volumes are
rising, and embodied-AI models are improving quickly. Investors are
assigning value to the prospect that these three curves will converge
into a major new industry.
Unitree is already more than a robot-dog company with a photogenic
humanoid sideline. Humanoids accounted for 1.88% of its main-business
revenue in 2023, 27.68% in 2024 and 51.78% in 2025. Total revenue
reached RMB1.70 billion in 2025. The company shipped 5,511 humanoids
that year, with 5,215 meeting its criteria for recognition as sales. It
reported RMB590.75 million of adjusted attributable profit. Nearly 44%
of main-business revenue came from overseas.
The operating business confirms that humanoid robotics is crossing
from research category into industrial sector. The valuation prices in a
much larger opportunity than today’s revenue and deployments can
support, which leaves investors exposed to both genuine technological
acceleration and speculative excess.
On 20 August, the morning after the listing, founder Wang Xingxing
addressed the World Robot Conference in Beijing.
reported
his belief that embodied intelligence is moving towards a