Following the Beijing World Robot Expo (August 8-12) and the World Humanoid Robot Competition (August 15-17), Agibot hosted its first Partner Conference in Shanghai on August 21. Below are the key takeaways from this conference:
Shipment Targets: It is estimated to ship several thousand units in 2025, tens of thousands in 2026, and subsequently reach an annual shipment volume of hundreds of thousands of units.
Launch of Two New Robots:Lingxi X2-W: A wheeled dual-arm robot prototype based on the X2 platform;D1 MaxPro: An enterprise-grade quadruped robot with a payload capacity of up to 50 kg (100 kg maximum) and a 5.5-hour swappable battery, specifically designed for industrial inspection, emergency rescue, and logistics operations.
New Dexterous Hand: Prior to the conference, Agibot released its OmniHand series dexterous hands, priced at RMB 14,800 (before discount) or RMB 19,800 for the version equipped with tactile sensors.
Product Availability: Agibot’s complete robot product line, including A2/X2 humanoid robots, D1 quadruped robots, and various accessories, is now available on AgbotMall and JD.com.
Startup Accelerator Program “Agibot Plan A”: Over the next three years, Agibot plans to incubate more than 50 early-stage projects and build an ecosystem worth RMB 100 billion.
Cooperation Partnerships: Agibot signed a cooperation agreement with Shangwei Investment Holding, which will assist Agibot in expanding into the Taiwan region of China, Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asian markets. Additionally, on July 8, Agibot announced the acquisition of a controlling stake (63.62%) in Shangwei New Materials.
Overseas Expansion Strategy: In North America, Agibot will focus on R&D and education cooperation, leveraging academic advantages to support further technological development. In Southeast Asia, Japan, South Korea, and Europe, Agibot will place greater emphasis on business cooperation.
Although the humanoid robot industry is still in its early stages, several trends have gradually emerged:
1.Humanoid Robot Startups Compete for Market Position; Full-Scale Competition Yet to Begin
The Chinese humanoid robot industry is developing rapidly, with startups competing for market leadership by rapidly launching products, demonstrating technologies, establishing partnerships, and actively seeking financing (even pursuing initial public offerings). Despite the increasingly crowded landscape, large enterprises such as BYD, Xiaomi, and BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent) have not yet shown significant progress or advantages in this field. So far, industry consolidation has not been obvious, but this situation may change soon. Currently, emerging startups are focused on exploring different solutions, building their own capabilities, and accumulating strength rather than engaging in market competition. However, as application penetration increases, hardware and software solutions mature, and large enterprises enter the market, we expect real competition and consolidation to commence, accompanied by broader industry growth (see our in-depth analysis report).
2.Shift from Demonstration to Practical Application
At the beginning of this year, the focus of the humanoid robot industry has shifted from demonstrating robots’ motion control capabilities to promoting practical applications and expanding application scenarios. It is expected that preliminary applications in commercial services and specific industrial tasks will gradually be realized starting from the second half of 2025. For example, China Mobile has placed an order of RMB 124 million with Agibot and Unitree Robotics, and Meiyi has placed an order of RMB 91 million with UBtech. We anticipate more orders to emerge in the second half of 2025.
3.Exploration of Diverse Application Scenarios
While initial applications will start in commercial services and specific industrial tasks, integrators are also actively exploring various application scenarios to capture market demand. For instance, Agibot has demonstrated the application capabilities of its intelligent robots in eight different fields, including reception, entertainment, industry, logistics, security, cleaning, data collection, and research & education.
4.Universal Platforms with Software Portability for Various Robot Forms
Morgan Stanley has observed a trend of developing multiple intelligent robot variants based on a unified architecture to adapt to different application scenarios. Agibot’s Lingxi X2 platform is a typical example, including bipedal X2, wheeled-bipedal hybrid X2-N, and wheeled X2-W models. Each model is tailored to different application scenarios while sharing a universal platform. Beyond Agibot, other humanoid robot manufacturers are also expanding their product portfolios, launching various robot forms to adapt to different scenarios—including small-sized and full-sized humanoid robots, wheeled hybrid robots, and quadruped robot designs—to achieve a better balance between work efficiency and cost. Recently released products include MagicBot’s small humanoid robot Z1 and quadruped robot MagicDog. Unitree Robotics has also released a preview of a new full-sized humanoid robot.
5.Dexterous Hands Become a Key Industry Focus
Dexterous hands are crucial for robots’ manipulation capabilities, and their application is expected to accelerate in the second half of 2025. Integrators (such as Unitree Robotics, Agibot), component suppliers (such as Zhaowei), and startups (such as Libo Robotics, Linkerbot, OY Motion) have launched dexterous hands, with rapid product iterations and different hand designs developed for various types of robots (see our video at the WRC). Tactile sensors are also key to enabling embodied models to understand mechanical dynamics and interact with physical objects.
6.Wheeled Humanoid Robots and Quadruped Robots Likely to Be Applied Earlier Than Bipedal Humanoid Robots
Due to relatively simpler algorithm optimization and stronger working capabilities at the current stage, wheeled humanoid robots and quadruped robots are expected to be applied in various scenarios earlier than bipedal humanoid robots. Bipedal humanoid robots, initially launched in reception and entertainment venues, have gained widespread attention in China, but large-scale commercial application in work scenarios may take time—especially since there are still bottlenecks in training data. Agibot is deploying hundreds of wheeled A2-W humanoid robots in the factory of Fulin Jinggong.
7.Rapid Iteration of Products and Technologies
With accumulated experience and testing, the pace of innovation in humanoid robots (including robot bodies and components) is accelerating. Approximately 150 new products from the entire value chain were showcased at the 2025 World Robot Expo. Various developer tools are driving technological/product iterations, such as emerging technologies like NVIDIA Cosmos and Google Genie3 world models, as well as China’s well-developed supply chain.
8.Rising Threshold for the Supply Chain
As robot applications become more widespread, the demand for components increases, and the need for automated production line construction becomes more urgent. Component enterprises must have large-scale production capabilities and ensure indicators such as product consistency, efficiency, yield rate, and cost. This places higher requirements on enterprises in terms of product development and large-scale production management. Morgan Stanley believes that the threshold for large-scale production of precision components will be very high.
9.Ecosystem Construction in Progress
Applications in software (e.g., Agibot’s Lingqu Operating System, which is planned to be open-sourced in Q4 2025) and hardware (e.g., Unitree Robotics, Agibot, EngineAl) are becoming increasingly abundant. At the World Humanoid Robot Competition, we saw many participating teams using robots from Unitree Robotics—including all eight robot boxing teams, which all adopted Unitree Robotics’ G1 robots and ran their own algorithms for the competition.
10.Global Expansion Launched
In addition to Agibot and Unitree Robotics, Kepler is also seeking to expand into the North American market through its strategic partner and investor Tao Motor. Dexterous hand suppliers are also supplying products to leading global technology companies and research institutions. In the intelligent robot field, many companies are expanding simultaneously—even prioritizing international markets—because these markets are less competitive than China, allowing them to gain better demand and profits (e.g., AMRs, lawn mowers, cleaning robots).
Morgan Stanley believes that the humanoid robot industry will remain active and dynamic driven by multiple factors. Over the past two years and the first half of 2025, the performance of stocks related to the humanoid robot value chain has been mainly driven by key catalysts. However, at present, attention should be paid to both catalysts (order adoption and new technologies) and profit contributions starting from the second half of 2025. It is expected that with the increase in new orders and delivery volumes, leading humanoid robot enterprises with large-scale production capabilities will gradually take the lead.
New Technology Catalysts
Although discussions about new materials (such as PEEK and magnesium alloys) and new structures (such as cycloidal pinwheel reducers) have been ongoing for some time, these technologies have not yet been put into practical application due to high costs and immature technology. However, according to channel research, major manufacturers such as Tesla and Agibot have been discussing these new solutions with suppliers. The application of key models is expected to boost market sentiment for related enterprises. Morgan Stanley also anticipates the gradual adoption of new technologies such as axial flux/PCB motors, vision-based tactile sensors, metal injection molding (MIM), and other polymers/composites.
On the software front, Morgan Stanley expects robot models to continue to improve, thereby achieving higher generalization capabilities and making full use of the latest tools such as NVIDIA Cosmos, Google Genie 3, and Huawei CloudRobo. Furthermore, in light of recent discussions about VLAs (see relevant discussions by the CEO of Unitree Robotics), the emergence of alternative model architectures may be witnessed—for example, Boston Dynamics’ Large Behavior Model (LBM), which uses a diffusion transformer as its core, while companies like NVIDIA utilize it as an auxiliary module for rapid movements.
While the effectiveness of such models remains to be verified, potential technological breakthroughs are foreseen, and it is believed that the improvement in intelligence is expected to boost market confidence in the humanoid robot industry, just as ChatGPT ignited the field of artificial intelligence.
Revenue and Profit Growth
As production and sales volumes gradually increase, it is expected that some upstream suppliers will begin to recognize revenue from humanoid robot customers in the first half of 2025. For instance, Leaderride’s financial report for the first half of 2025 showed a significant year-on-year growth in revenue related to humanoid robots. Topstar reported that approximately half of its CNC machining centers are supplying parts to humanoid robot component vendors. Robosense delivered 34,000 lidar units for robots and other fields in the second quarter of 2025 (a year-on-year increase of 632%). Hesai delivered 49,000 robot lidar units in the second quarter of 2025. As other humanoid robot integrators/component suppliers—such as Changsheng (a major supplier of Unitree Robotics) and Zhongda Lide (a major supplier of Agibot)—are set to release their first-half 2025 results this week, the recognition of revenue from humanoid robots may signal significant commercial value and boost investment sentiment across the entire industry and related themes.
Leading Core Component Manufacturers
Even if humanoid robot-related products of leading manufacturers in the precision component field are still under development, these companies still have advantages in large-scale production compared with emerging manufacturers. Existing expertise in machinery, materials, cost optimization for large-scale production, and global networks can be applied to the humanoid robot field. In addition to Leaderride (which is under focus), it has also been observed that Hengli’s screw business is progressing smoothly, with ongoing customer verification. Shuanghuan is also collaborating with a major customer to develop a new type of reducer. Huichuan plans to launch a rotary actuator for humanoid robots this year as well.
