Bar length is the dollar figure. The right-hand columns give the figure and what kind of number it is: a post-money valuation at a closed funding round, a listed company's market value on a stated day, a proposed-deal pre-money value, or (hatched bars) a round still reported as in negotiation. These are different kinds of numbers and are not strictly comparable.
One provider, one period, one measure: Counterpoint Research's estimate of vendor shipments, January–June 2026, out of more than 22,000 worldwide (up nearly 300% on a year earlier). UBTech is given as "thousand-unit level." Counterpoint does not say whether wheeled dual-arm machines are counted. Estimates differ by provider: Smart Analytics Global puts the same half-year at ~19,100 units (AgiBot 8,400, Unitree 5,900; Chinese makers >97%). Neither is audited sales or robots in productive work. Western developers do not publish unit counts.
The most valuable listed humanoid-focused company is a founder-led business with a dozen minority state owners, a U.S. military-company designation and a customer list that runs from universities to the police. From WireScreen's corporate record for Unitree Technology Co., Ltd. (宇树科技股份有限公司, 688836.SH).
Wang Xingxing directly controls 27% of the firm and shares a 4.3% management vehicle with a dozen colleagues, though official disclosures leave open whether he exercises voting control over that collective stake. The largest outside investor is not a venture fund but Wang Xing, the billionaire founder of Meituan, who holds 6.5% in his own name; entities tied to his delivery empire formed the biggest external block when the company went public. Lei Jun's Shunwei Capital holds another 4%.
A look-through analysis by WireScreen calculates total state ownership at 8.7%. Beijing's municipal asset commission holds the largest stake, followed by the national pension fund, the State Council, and an assortment of seven regional commissions and collectives. The remaining shares are divided among state-backed financial groups including CITIC, China Merchants, and ICBC, none owning more than 0.5%. Government guidance funds make up 3.8 points of the total. What emerges is a founder-led business with modest official holdings rather than an arm of the state.
RMB 342bn at the close of its August 19, 2026 debut; down roughly 39% to RMB 208bn by October 2026.
Incorporated on August 26, 2016 in Hangzhou's Binjiang District. 227 published patents. Registered capital of RMB 404m. Listed on Shanghai's STAR Market in August 2026.
DoD 1260H · Defense contractor · State security contractor
Government ownership: 8.7% · Top AI companies & institutes
In June 2026 the U.S. Department of Defense added Unitree to its Section 1260H list of Chinese military-linked companies operating in the United States, two months ahead of its Shanghai debut. The Federal Register notice outlines the Pentagon's rationale: the company is classified as "indirectly owned by and indirectly affiliated with" Beijing's state assets commission, and tied to China's military-civil fusion strategy via state support associated with its official "Little Giant" enterprise status. The notice cites no specific defense contracts and provides no ownership figures. WireScreen's data measures total government ownership at 8.7% across a dozen public entities; the specific SASAC connection referenced by the Pentagon is Beijing's municipal commission, with a 3.6% stake.
Procurement filings in WireScreen detail some of the buyers. They include the Tianjin Public Security Bureau's tactical police squad (a four-legged patrol robot in 2021), Beihang University's Unmanned Systems Research Institute (lidar assemblies), China Telecom and Sinopec (inspection robots), and a cluster of research institutions—Zhejiang Sci-Tech, Tongji, Shanghai, and the Harbin Institute of Technology—for humanoid and research platforms. Farther afield, Unitree's marketing features the logos of Nvidia, Amazon, and Google. Only the Nvidia link is substantiated: in June 2026 the chipmaker anchored its humanoid research kit on Unitree's H2 chassis. What Amazon and Google buy is not disclosed.
Palo Alto / Fremont. Optimus Gen 2 unveiled 2023; a 22-DoF hand shown in late 2024; V3 not yet unveiled as of Oct 2026. Designs its own actuators and FSD-derived brain; contract-builds parts via Sanhua, Tuopu and others (reported). Musk's stated target: a ~$20,000 robot at mass scale. No unit disclosures.
San Jose, California. Figure 03 in production, per the company; in-house Helix VLA model after splitting from OpenAI. BMW Spartanburg deployment; BotQ plant has a stated capacity target of 12,000 units a year. Backers across rounds: Microsoft, NVIDIA, Bezos (2024), Intel Capital, Brookfield (2025).
Shanghai; began in rehabilitation robotics. GR-2 and GR-3 general-purpose humanoids, among the first Chinese models sold to overseas research labs. Backers: SoftBank Vision Fund, Saudi Aramco's Prosperity7.
Shanghai; founded 2023 by ex-Huawei "genius youth" Peng Zhihui. 10,000th unit off the line in Mar 2026, 15,000th in Jun 2026; ~9,700 shipped in H1 2026, 43% of the world (Counterpoint). Backers: CATL, Tencent, Hillhouse, Shanghai state funds. Preparing a Hong Kong IPO (announced Jul 2026).
Austin; UT spin-out. Apollo in Mercedes-Benz and GXO facilities; Jabil is its manufacturing partner, Google DeepMind its AI partner. Backers: Google, Mercedes-Benz, B Capital, ARK.
Beijing; Peking University spin-out. Wheeled-base G1 in retail pharmacies; in-house VLA models trained on synthetic data. $663M raised across Dec 2025 and Mar 2026 rounds. Backers: ByteDance, Meituan, Beijing state funds.
Oregon. Digit is the most-deployed Western humanoid: nine customer facilities (Schaeffler, GXO, Toyota Canada, Mercado Libre), >65,000 operating hours; Amazon tests. Schaeffler is an investor and actuator partner.
Metzingen. Europe's best-funded player; 4NE-1 humanoid plus cognitive cobots. Acquired ek Robotics. Partners: Volvo, Deutsche Telekom, Schaeffler.
Shenzhen. Sold 1,079 full-size humanoids in 2025; full-size humanoid products and services brought in RMB 820.6m of revenue (2025 annual report); Walker S series deployed with automakers reported to include BYD, Dongfeng and Zeekr. Listed in Hong Kong since 2023. Backers: Tencent, CDH.
Norwegian-founded; global headquarters moved to Palo Alto in 2025. NEO, the first consumer home humanoid: 10,000 pre-orders in five days (late 2025); Hayward, CA plant opened Apr 2026 with a stated target of 100,000 units a year by 2027.
Shenzhen. PM01 and T800; company says its line can build one T800 every 15 minutes. Hong Kong IPO filed. Luxshare, a major Apple supplier and electronics assembler, is a co-lead investor and manufacturing partner.
Waltham, MA; controlled by Hyundai Motor Group (hence the Korean flag), which agreed in July 2026 to buy SoftBank's remaining 9.65%. Electric Atlas to start at Hyundai's Georgia EV plant in 2028; Hyundai's stated group-wide target is 30,000 Atlas units a year. Actuators from Hyundai Mobis; a major humanoid patent holder with a high-impact portfolio.
Vision-language-action models that turn a camera feed and an instruction into motor commands. Sold as a layer for other companies' hardware (Physical Intelligence, Skild, Google) or built in-house by the robot maker (Figure, Tesla, 1X).
Digital-twin environments in which robots train before deployment, the engines beneath them, the firms that collect or synthesize the motion data the models learn from, and the platforms that analyze fleet sensor data.
The system-on-chip at the center of the robot, the vision processors at the edge, and the DRAM and NAND both depend on. Data-center GPUs train the models; edge SoCs run them.
Processor architectures, design software and the foundries that would make humanoid-specific silicon.
Convert motor rotation into linear motion. Ball screws today; planetary roller screws, among the costliest and most demanding parts in a linear actuator, over time.
Harmonic (strain-wave) reducers for rotary joints, planetary gearboxes for hands and legs. Japan has dominated the high end for decades.
Frameless torque motors in the limbs; coreless micro-motors in the hands. Foreign makers (maxon, Faulhaber, Portescap) still lead China's coreless-motor market, per MIR Databank (2025); frameless motors are a lower barrier.
Neodymium-iron-boron permanent magnets inside every motor. China produced 91% of the world's refined rare earths and 94% of its sintered rare-earth magnets in 2024 (IEA).
Cross-roller and angular-contact bearings hold each joint true; encoders report position and speed back to the controller.
Integrated units that turn electrical power into joint motion, combining motor, transmission, bearings, sensors and control electronics. Some robot makers develop their own (labeled); specialist suppliers offer complete modules or jointly engineered designs.
Image sensors, stereo and depth cameras that give the robot its eyes. Most humanoids run several.
Depth and distance from lasers and radio; inertial measurement units for balance. Largely borrowed from the autonomous-vehicle supply chain.
Six-axis force/torque sensors at the wrists and ankles, torque sensors in each joint, and emerging electronic skin for the fingertips. The largest line in the 2025 Optimus cost model.
One of the most demanding sub-assemblies to build, and increasingly bought whole. Multi-finger hands vary widely in actuation, dexterity and tactile sensing.
Motor drivers, microcontrollers, magnetic position sensors and power management that sit between the brain and every actuator.
Cylindrical lithium-ion cells packed in the torso; manufacturer-stated runtimes commonly range from two to five hours, and actual operating time varies with load. The same cell makers that supply EVs.
Aluminum die-cast skeletons and joint housings, plus PEEK and other engineering polymers that replace metal to save weight.
Harnesses and connectors that distribute power and data to dozens of joints, and the pumps and cold plates that keep motors from overheating.
Industrial-automation suppliers and contract manufacturers with capabilities relevant to humanoid production.
Companies with a named humanoid product or a disclosed in-house program. Industry of origin in the label.
Corporations with a disclosed equity stake in a humanoid developer. Venture funds are not shown.
Companies testing or operating another developer's humanoids in their facilities, or contracted to build them.
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