AI² Robotics Raises $144M for Factory Humanoids
AI² Robotics has raised over $144 million in a Series B funding round, valuing the company at more than $1.45 billion. The company is deploying its AlphaBot humanoids, powered by Vision-Language-Action (VLA) models, in automotive factories. This funding highlights significant investor confidence in the application of advanced AI models for humanoid robots in industrial settings.
- The company was founded in April 2023 by Dr. Guo Yandong, who previously served as the chief scientist at electric vehicle manufacturer XPeng and smartphone maker Oppo. The team also includes veterans from Microsoft and the autonomous driving company Momenta. - Key strategic investors in the Series B round include internet giant Baidu, which will help enhance the company's AI model capabilities, and state-owned train manufacturer CRRC, which will provide manufacturing and testing expertise. The inclusion of brokerage firm Guotai Haitong Securities suggests AI² Robotics may be preparing for a future IPO. - The AlphaBot's "Alpha Brain" is powered by a proprietary model called GOVLA (Global and Omni-body Vision-Language-Action), designed for 360-degree spatial understanding and reasoning through complex, long-horizon tasks. This allows the robot to perform a full chain of services, like finding ingredients and cooking, without requiring objects to be placed in its immediate view. - The latest hardware iteration, AlphaBot 2, is a wheeled, dual-arm robot with core components rated for over 50,000 hours of failure-free operation, meeting industrial-grade reliability standards. - AI² Robotics launched its own production line in September 2025 with an initial annual capacity of 1,000 units and plans to scale to 10,000 units in 2026. The company has already secured a three-year order for 1,000 robots from HKC, a major manufacturer of liquid crystal display panels. - The funding highlights a broader investment surge in China's embodied AI sector, with competitors like Galaxea AI, LimX Dynamics, and Galbot also closing funding rounds of around 1 billion yuan in late 2025. - The focus on automotive factories places AI² in a competitive landscape where major automakers are actively testing humanoids. BMW is working with Figure AI, Mercedes-Benz with Apptronik, and Nio with UBTech Robotics for tasks like lineside logistics and quality inspection.
