After attracting 28 billion yuan in funds, this sector has changed.
August 8th was a weekday with light rain, but people's enthusiasm for robots didn't wane because of it. After the opening of the 2025 World Robot Conference (WRC) in Yizhuang, Beijing on that day, there was a huge influx of people. In front of every booth with robot performances, the audience packed the area tightly.
On August 9th, the second day of the opening, a large number of parents brought their children to visit. A staff member sighed, "I walked around and my shoes were stepped off several times."
According to official reports, the scale of this year's conference reached a record high, bringing together more than 200 domestic and foreign enterprises, displaying over 1,500 exhibits, and debuting more than 100 new products. The number of humanoid robot complete - machine enterprises even exceeded 50.
Different from last year's mainly static displays, this year the robots "moved" one by one: Unitree Robotics carried out a somewhat clumsy fighting performance on the ring; Zhongqing Robotics brought a robot catwalk show; Zhujidongli Robotics performed a national dance full of charm; Zibianliang Robotics demonstrated its micro - operation ability by packing purses; Qianxun Intelligence Robotics demonstrated the skill of folding clothes, and Ubtech moved a complete factory work process to the booth...
Source: Respondent
A more significant change is that the focus of the exhibition of the participating products has shifted from performance to practicality. Tan Min, the Chief Brand Officer of Ubtech, which has participated in the exhibition for eight years, sighed, "This year, the focus of the participating humanoid robots has shifted to real - world applications. Although there are still demonstrations of singing and dancing, they are no longer the mainstream."
The industrial ecosystem has also heated up simultaneously: The world's first embodied intelligent robot 4S store opened in the Yizhuang Industrial Park near the venue, and its staff also participated in the conference. They revealed that they had facilitated several to - B procurement deals, and the Ubtech Walker S1, the Tianggong 2.0 of the Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Center, and the rapidly evolving Booster T1 on display at the scene became the best - selling models.
Sun Rongyi, the vice - president of Qianxun Intelligence, told "China Entrepreneur" that some foreign customers had clearly stated that they would visit their booth during the WRC and seek cooperation. Wang Qian, the founder of Zibianliang Robotics, also said that he had met with "a large number of investors" intensively on the afternoon of the 8th, and many of them had expressed investment intentions.
Moreover, several humanoid robot companies revealed their mass - production plans or delivery targets for this year to "China Entrepreneur". Limited by production capacity, almost all manufacturers set their targets in the range of several hundred to one thousand units. However, with a high unit price of hundreds of thousands of yuan per unit, some leading manufacturers expect their revenue to exceed 100 million yuan this year.
However, beneath the hustle and bustle, there is also calm thinking. An industry insider said bluntly that the current commercial products of various companies have not been launched in the "satisfying" way that the market most expects, and many enterprises still focus on the to - VC logic. He explained that the balance point for mass - producing robots has not been found yet - cost reduction, precision, lifespan, and reliability restrict each other, and it is difficult for products to be stably adapted to industrial or service scenarios. The future still faces huge challenges.
When humanoid robots move from the booth "showcase" to the real "battlefield", a tough battle related to hardware mass - production, software (brain model) development, and industrial chain support has fully begun.
Replacing "Pain Points of Human Labor" Is More Important
"This year, the mindset of the participating enterprises has shifted from concept - orientation to engineering - orientation, from skill - showing displays to real - world scenarios," said an investor in the robot field from Shoucheng Holdings. This marks that the humanoid robot industry is undergoing a systematic leap from the "verification period" to the "delivery period".
As "China Entrepreneur" learned, more than a hundred industrial versions of the Ubtech Walker S have been deployed in factories such as BYD, BAIC, and FAW - Audi, focusing on training and data collection in three scenarios: handling, quality inspection, and sorting. Tan Min revealed that Ubtech's goal is to deliver 500 industrial humanoid robots and 500 commercial service robots this year. Calculated based on the delivery scale of 1,000 humanoid robots, the revenue can reach 100 times that of last year.
As an established manufacturer in the industrial robot field, Siasun Robotics also brought three newly launched humanoid products to the WRC this year. According to different customer requirements, they can enter service and industrial scenarios to complete certain tasks.
Yang Chenfeng, the product director of Xingchen Intelligence, pointed out that their robots can currently achieve a certain degree of refined operation. At the WRC site, their robots demonstrated tasks such as brewing hand - ground coffee and mixing salads. Yang Chenfeng said that the main implementation direction of their robots is the service industry. Currently, they have been implemented in some nursing homes and retail supermarkets in Shenzhen, and they are also in discussions for cooperation in pharmacies, hotels, and catering.
Photography: Kong Yuexin
Xingdong Jiyuan also displayed robots for industrial and service scenarios at the scene. Its staff said that their robots can "work" in automobile factories and can also perform delicate actions such as drawing curtains. In the service scenario, Xingdong Jiyuan launched a wheeled - chassis service robot that can provide shopping - guide services in shopping malls and scenic areas. Currently, it has cooperated with Century Ginwa and is undergoing practical training in the mall. In addition, Xingdong Jiyuan jointly developed a household service robot with Haier, which can provide services such as making the bed, taking out the trash, opening the refrigerator, doing the laundry, and frying eggs, and can be called a "cyber butler".
However, limited by the capacity bottleneck of the embodied intelligent large - model (the "brain") and the lack of practical training caused by the shortage of training data, the humanoid robots of current enterprises are still in the stage of scenario - cooperation training and continuous iteration. Wang Xingxing, the founder of Unitree Technology, said in his speech at the WRC that the main bottleneck restricting the development of humanoid robots currently lies in the embodied intelligent large - model, rather than hardware or data.
This has also led to a certain tendency of homogenization in the commercial implementation scenarios of various robot manufacturers, highly concentrated in areas of repetitive labor such as logistics handling, factory assembly, front - desk reception, and coffee making.
The implementation of robots is not only about replacing human labor but more importantly, replacing "pain points of human labor". In the view of Yao Song, the director of the International Advanced Technology Application Promotion Center (Shenzhen), in the implementation scenarios of robots, the highest priority is life - risk scenarios, followed by health - risk scenarios, physiological - aversion scenarios, and finally the repetitive - labor scenarios that most companies are doing. At present, the first three scenarios may be implemented faster, while the fourth scenario has a larger market scale.
Zero - Power Robotics, established in January 2025, focuses on the third pain point. The humanoid robots it developed are specifically designed for scenarios such as public toilets, hotel toilets, airport and high - speed - rail toilets. Zhou Yikang, the solution director of the company, revealed that currently overseas, there is a severe shortage of hotel cleaning staff, and Zero - Power has received 500 orders from Japan, Singapore, etc. The company's mass - production target for 2025 is 1,000 units.
Yao Song pointed out that the development of robots should be like that of autonomous driving back then. They should abandon the obsession with "fully automatic" and give priority to strengthening the tool attribute. For example, elderly - care robots can also function as wheelchairs, and children's robots can focus on reading picture books. They should enter scenarios based on basic needs to obtain data and then gradually iterate their intelligent capabilities.
In addition, Yao Song believes that the scientific research teaching aids field is also a good market. The market scale is in the tens of billions, which is large enough to support a listed company.
Breaking Through Amidst the Capital Boom and Technical Hurdles
In 2025, more and more hot money is pouring into the robot track at an accelerating pace.
In the first half of this year, the number of financing events in the robot field showed a continuous upward trend. According to IT Juzi, as of August 10th, 2025, the total financing in the entire embodied intelligent track was nearly 28 billion yuan. In July alone, 21 companies received new financing. Since August, Fourier, Zhiyuan Robotics, Pacini, Songyan Power, Qiaojie Shuwu, Lingxin Qiaoshou, and Vita Power announced that they had received new financing support.
The investor from Shoucheng Holdings judged that the financing heat would continue in the second half of the year but would tend to diverge: Robot enterprises with real - world scenario closed - loops and delivery capabilities, as well as core component enterprises that can significantly reduce costs and increase efficiency, will be more popular; it will be more difficult for pure - concept projects to obtain capital.
In response, Tan Min said, "We have witnessed the prosperity of the entire industry this year. In the past two years, nearly 200 start - up enterprises related to humanoid robots have emerged in China, which means that the prosperous period of Chinese humanoid robots has arrived."
Another notable feature at the WRC site this year is the leap in the technical capabilities of the upstream of the industrial chain. Inside the exhibition hall, core components such as dexterous hands and joint modules have achieved professional breakthroughs. Lidar and multi - modal sensors are accelerating their integration into the AI decision - making closed - loop, providing key support for downstream complete - machine manufacturers.
"From the complete - machine to core components such as dexterous hands and chips, the flourishing of the industrial chain is promoting the overall technological leap of the industry. This benign ecosystem provides solid support for the innovative development of enterprises such as Ubtech," Tan Min said.
However, behind the prosperity, there are still technical hurdles to be solved. At the WRC site this year, there were still cases where some demonstration robots had insufficient operating stability and "failed" in their performances. Many audiences also complained that the "working" robots moved slowly and were inefficient. The embarrassment of robots running out of power due to overtime demonstrations and having to "lie down and charge" also occurred from time to time.
An industry insider pointed out that the current operating efficiency of robots is less than one - third of that of human labor, far from reaching the market's expected level. An exhibitor admitted that if a robot with the same capabilities as this year's was exhibited at last year's WRC, it would definitely sell like hotcakes. However, the outside world's expectations have significantly increased, and the actual sales performance may fall short of expectations.
Xie Tiandi, the marketing director of RoboSense, holds an optimistic attitude. He believes that since this year, with the robot industry attracting the attention of the whole society, the industry has grown rapidly. Although the outside world's expectations are too high, this high expectation has a positive incentive effect and has accelerated the development process of the entire industry in the past six months.
At the same time, he admitted that the current robot industry still faces many hurdles, such as in terms of reliability, materials, motors, large - models, computing power, and chips. "However, the industry as a whole is on a continuous upward trend. Compared with January this year, the capabilities in various aspects such as technology and production have improved significantly. It is expected that there will be great differences in development by the end of this year and next year," Xie Tiandi said.
This article is from the WeChat public account "China Entrepreneur Magazine" (ID: iceo - com - cn), written by Kong Yuexin and edited by Ma Jiying, and is published by 36Kr with authorization.