Unitree's IPO may be just the beginning of an investor frenzy over humanoid-robot stocks

By William Gavin

The Chinese company will be the first to market in a wave of new humanoid-robotics IPOs

Unitree has made a name for itself in the nascent humanoid-robot market.

Unitree Robotics is set to become the first public humanoid-robotics company in mainland China, and it's riding the robotics hype straight to the bank.

Last week, the Hangzhou-based company priced its shares at about $22, seeking to raise about $900 million in an initial public offering on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. On Monday, it said the IPO was more than 8,000 times oversubscribed by retail investors, a sign that interest in the burgeoning industry is strong.

The market for humanoid robots is still pretty small - just 15,000 or so units were deployed last year - but advocates like Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk say the potential is massive. For now, Unitree sits near the top of the food chain.

Unitree was the single biggest supplier of humanoid robots last year, although it was outsold in the first half of 2026 by Chinese rival Agibot, according to a report from Smart Analytics Global. The research firm said sales at Unitree and Agibot grew 170% and 562%, respectively, on a year-over-year basis.

Overall, shipments of humanoid robots "nearly quadrupled" in the first half of 2026, according to the research firm. The top five suppliers were all Chinese firms. That's largely because of how cheap Chinese robots are compared with rival products.

Unitree was founded in 2016 by Wang Xingxing and became known for its quadruped robots, which were adopted by many researchers for their tests. Its humanoid robots have also been used by U.S. roboticists, because robots made in the U.S. tend to be pricey.

Nvidia (NVDA) in May said it had selected Unitree's H2 humanoid robot as the first robotics system it would sell to researchers, noting that a few universities had already agreed to use its design. Unitree bots have also been used for entertainment, dancing on "America's Got Talent" and performing martial arts in Beijing.

Unitree is profitable, a relatively uncommon feat in the world of humanoid-robotics companies. Its revenue hit nearly 1.7 billion yuan ($252 million) against adjusted net profit of about 590 million yuan ($87,000). Overseas sales accounted for over 40% of Unitree's revenue in 2025, although the company has warned that geopolitical tensions could hamper its expansion.

Last month, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission banned new foreign-made humanoid and quadruped robots. In March, Unitree and artificial-intelligence firm DeepSeek were also the subject of a hearing of the U.S. House Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection.

Unitree does not appear to have an official listing date. The company didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

The rush to go public

Unitree is set to complete its IPO and become China's first onshore-listed humanoid-robotics company, but it's not the only such firm seeking to go public.

Shanghai-based Agibot has initiated the process to list its shares in Hong Kong, according to China's Securities Times. So have Chinese startups X Square Robot and Galbot, per the South China Morning Post.

Each follows the lead of Ubtech Robotics (HK:9880), which listed in Hong Kong nearly three years ago after raising just $130 million. In a note to clients last month, Citi analyst Jamie Wang said Unitree's IPO could decrease Ubtech's "scarcity premium" and pressure its stock, which is down 29% so far this year.

Leju Robotics, which makes the Kuavo humanoid robot, filed in May to list on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange's ChiNext index, according to Reuters. LimX Dynamics, another startup, is preparing to go public after raising $200 million from investors last month.

"Listing is a must," LimX Dynamics founder Will Zhang told reporters in July, according to remarks translated by CNBC.

"Once the technology is mature, if [the company] doesn't list, then like WM Motor, it may disappear," Zhang added, referring to the Chinese electric-vehicle brand that filed for bankruptcy in 2023 before resuming production in late 2025.

Salem, Ore.-based Agility Robotics plans to become the first pure-play public humanoid-robotics company in the U.S. through a $2.5 billion deal with a special-purpose acquisition company. Already on the market is electric-vehicle maker Tesla, which is developing the Optimus humanoid robot.

Agility CEO Peggy Johnson recently told MarketWatch that her company sees going public as a way to help it "accelerate" its ability to engage with customers. The firm's Digit robots are operating in commercial environments with Germany's Schaeffler (XE:SHA0) and Connecticut-based GXO Logistics (GXO), among others.

"We have not achieved [return on investment] on humanoids yet," Patrick Kelleher, the CEO of GXO, told investors last week. "I think we are a couple of years away from that, but we're seeing such great progress with our partners around the efficacy of that technology and the application opportunities that it has in the warehouse environment."

-William Gavin

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08-11-26 1317ET