Unitree's $904-Million Robot Bet: Why is China Going Crazy for Humanoids?

China's Unitree Robotics launched its IPO on the Shanghai Stock Exchange's STAR Market, seeking to raise about 6.1 billion yuan ($904 million) by pricing 40.45 million new shares at 150.80 yuan each, giving the company a valuation of roughly 61 billion yuan ($9 billion). Retail demand exceeded available shares by more than 8,000 times, with odds of allocation at just 0.018%. Unitree, founded in 2016 by Wang Xingxing, sold 33,294 quadruped robots and 5,632 humanoid robots between 2023 and 2025, generating 1.70 billion yuan in revenue in 2025, but its first-quarter 2026 adjusted net profit fell about 52.6% due to rising costs.

Unitree's $904-Million Robot Bet: Why is China Going Crazy for Humanoids? A robot that dances, kicks, flips and walks on two legs is now heading for the stock market. China’s Unitree Robotics has launched its much-anticipated IPO on the Shanghai Stock Exchange’s STAR Market, seeking to raise around 6.1 billion yuan $904 million . The company has priced the offering at 150.80 yuan a share, giving it a valuation of roughly 61 billion yuan, or about $9 billion. And investors are behaving as if they have spotted the next big thing. Retail demand has reportedly exceeded the shares available by more than 8,000 times, leaving individual investors with a lottery-like chance of getting an allocation. So, what exactly are investors buying into? What is Unitree Robotics? Unitree is a Hangzhou-based robotics company founded in 2016 by Wang Xingxing. It makes both quadruped and humanoid robots, as well as components and technologies for what the industry calls “embodied AI”, AI systems designed to perceive and act in the physical world. Its robots have become something of a global internet sensation, thanks to their ability to dance, perform martial-arts moves and execute surprisingly agile movements. The company is now set to become the first humanoid-robot maker listed on China’s mainland stock exchanges. Its IPO is also being seen as another sign of China’s push to channel capital towards cutting-edge technologies. The Age of Anger 31 Jul 2026 - Vol 05 | Issue 31 A raging generation makes the government relent. What's next? Read Now The Age of Anger /magazine/the-age-of-anger How big is this IPO? Pretty big. Unitree is issuing around 40.45 million new shares at 150.80 yuan each, equivalent to 10% of its enlarged share capital. The offering is expected to raise about 6.1 billion yuan, or $904 million. The valuation works out to roughly 61 billion yuan, or about $9 billion. And here is where things get interesting. At that price, Unitree is being valued at around 219 times its projected 2025 earnings. Investors clearly believe the company is not merely selling robots today. They are betting on what the humanoid-robot market could become tomorrow. And investors are really that excited? Yes. Almost ridiculously so. The retail portion of the IPO was reportedly more than 8,000 times oversubscribed. In other words, individual investors wanted more than 8,000 times the number of shares available to them. That translates into a lottery-like allocation, with the odds of winning reportedly just 0.018%. The frenzy reflects something bigger than Unitree itself. Humanoid robots have moved from science-fiction demonstrations into one of China’s hottest technology investment themes. Unitree’s IPO is effectively becoming a public-market test of how much investors believe that future is worth. But does Unitree actually sell robots at scale? It does. According to the company’s prospectus, Unitree sold 33,294 quadruped robots and 5,632 humanoid robots between 2023 and 2025. Its humanoid shipments alone crossed 5,500 units in 2025. And the company’s revenue is growing rapidly. Unitree generated around 1.70 billion yuan in revenue in 2025, up from 392.77 million yuan in 2024 and 159.13 million yuan in 2023. It reported net profit of 278.21 million yuan in 2025. That makes Unitree unusual in the humanoid-robot race. It isn’t just promising a future. It already has a business. So, what’s the catch? The robots may be moving faster than the business. Unitree’s first-quarter 2026 numbers offered a warning. Revenue continued to grow, but adjusted net profit fell by about 52.6% as research, development and marketing costs climbed. The industry is becoming intensely competitive, with companies spending heavily to develop increasingly sophisticated machines. In other words, building a humanoid that can dance is one problem. Building a humanoid that customers will pay for, deploy at scale and keep buying is another. What will Unitree do with the IPO money? About 4.2 billion yuan of the proceeds is earmarked for four major projects focused on intelligent-robot model research, robot-body R&D, new intelligent-robot products and an intelligent-robot manufacturing base. The objective is straightforward: make better robot “brains”, improve the hardware and increase manufacturing capacity. The money will essentially fund the next stage of the race, as Unitree tries to move from impressive demonstrations to a much larger commercial footprint. Who is Unitree competing with? The obvious global names are Tesla’s Optimus and Boston Dynamics. But the real competition is broader. China has become a hotbed for humanoid robotics, with several startups racing to develop machines that can eventually operate in factories, warehouses, shops and other human environments. Unitree’s IPO could give the sector a major boost because it creates a public-market benchmark for the value of a humanoid-robot company. The listing is therefore about more than one company. It could help establish how investors value China’s rapidly expanding “embodied AI” industry. What makes Unitree different? Price and accessibility are a big part of the story. Unitree has built a reputation for producing relatively affordable robots compared with some Western competitors, while also using spectacular demonstrations to showcase what its machines can do. Its humanoids have appeared in high-profile performances and demonstrations, helping turn a relatively obscure robotics company into a recognisable name. That visibility matters. The more people see humanoids performing increasingly complex tasks, the easier it becomes to imagine them outside laboratories. But imagination is still ahead of deployment. Where could these robots actually be used? That remains one of the biggest unanswered questions. Potential applications include manufacturing, logistics, warehousing, retail, research and other environments where robots could perform repetitive or physically demanding tasks. But widespread commercial deployment remains limited. The challenge is not merely making a robot walk. It is making one useful enough to justify replacing, supplementing or working alongside a human. That is where the real test begins. Is geopolitics another risk? Yes. Unitree has a significant overseas business, with more than 40% of its sales coming from outside China, according to the Financial Times. The US accounted for a meaningful portion of its revenue, creating exposure to changing American restrictions on Chinese robotics technology. That makes the company’s global ambitions more complicated. The humanoid race is technological. It is also increasingly geopolitical. So, what is this IPO really telling us? Perhaps that investors are no longer treating humanoid robots as a distant science-fiction story. They are beginning to price them as an industry. Unitree has revenue. It has profits. It has thousands of robots in the market. It has a manufacturing ambition. And now it has something even more powerful: a public valuation. But the $9 billion question is still unanswered. Can Unitree turn impressive robots into an enormous business? For now, investors seem willing to bet heavily on the answer being yes. The robots haven’t taken over the world yet. The stock market, however, appears ready to give them a head start. With inputs from ANI