In 2025, the industrial environment is changing at an unprecedented pace thanks to the deep integration of humanoid robots and artificial intelligence technologies. Against the backdrop of Optimus, which has entered into mass production of Tesla, Huaway has increased its capital investment in its humanoid robot subsidiary to 38.9 billion yuan, and the industry has moved from the “conceptual verification stage” to the “commercialization and implementation stage.”
Meanwhile, the breakthrough in large-scale AI model technology provides a powerful “brain” with humanoid robots, which provide AI to the “body” to interact with the physical world. Two coordinated developments open the brand – a new era of “embodied intelligence.” According to Wind Data, in the first half of 2025, the average revenue for the A-Share Humanoid Robot Concept sector increased by 9.72% per year, while the average revenue growth rate for the AI application field reached 18.7%, significantly higher than the overall stock level, according to Wind Data.
This wave of innovation not only attracted high attention from the capital markets, but also began to expose real value in scenarios such as industrial manufacturing, healthcare, and home services. Can rapid implementation of AI and humanoid robot technology turn science fiction into reality?
01 AI Applications: From technological empowerment to value creation
2025 is seen as an important turning point for AI applications to move from the spread of technology concepts to deep industry integration. IDC data shows that the global AI market size is expected to reach $221.87 billion in 2025, with a combined annual growth rate of around 26.2%, and the Chinese market is becoming an important engine for this growth.
Technically, the characteristics of AI applications are characterized by “full-scale expansion and high value – additional leadership.” In the field of computing infrastructure, ZTE Corporation (000063.SZ) liquid-cooling servers and AI servers have become industry benchmarks.
In the field of multimodal content generation, Wondershare Technology Group Co., Ltd. (300624.SZ) achieved native application revenue of 60 million yuan on the AI-TIANMU 2.0 multimodal model, with the number of paid users increasing by 200% per year. In the field of industrial digitalization, Taiji Computer Corporation (002368.SZ)'s government big data platform solutions serve more than 30 states and municipalities across the country. Enterprise – For Intelligent Agents at the Enterprise – Level, Hand Enterprise Solutions Co., Ltd. (300170.SZ) has launched approximately 100 mature intelligent agents, with contract value exceeding 25 million yuan.
Industry technical breakthroughs are particularly important as the efforts of major companies are prominent. Tencent's Hunyuan Turbos employs a transformer-manba hybrid architecture, doubles the inference efficiency. Hong Technology Co., Ltd. (300441.SZ)'s market share for Ultra-High-Lefinition Video AI Processing Solution is 35%. Rokid AI glasses have sold over 1 million units, with an average price below 2,000 yuan, indicating the widespread adoption of Edge-Side AI applications.
Of course, in addition to development, the industry also faces multiple challenges. First, there is the issue of data privacy. The IBM report shows that 16% of data breaches in 2025 are related to the use of AI tools. Second, there is a risk of algorithm bias, which can lead to unfair outcomes for financial credit approval and medical diagnosis. Third, regulatory policies are tightening. Cross -Border AI Enterprise has been fined 20 million yuan for non-compliant data transfer overseas. This serves as a warning of industry compliance risks.
In particular, 54% of companies still cannot quantify their AI return on investment (according to Deloitte data), indicating that the industry still needs to make breakthroughs to validate commercial value. However, the deep integration of AI technology and industry has made it increasingly clear to the path to value creation, especially intensive areas such as finance and healthcare, as AI applications move from “additive tools” to “business partners.”
02 Humanoid Robot: From technology verification to scenario implementation
If 2024 was the “year of technical breakthrough” for humanoid robots, 2025 is undoubtedly the “first year of commercialization.” The “Opinion of the Artificial Intelligence+” initiative published by the Council of State has clearly supported the development of intelligent robots. Beijing has established the Humanoid Robot Innovation Centre, releasing the world's first “Intelligent Classification Standards for Humanoid Robots” to provide policy support for industry development.
Driven by policy support and markets, all aspects of the humanoid robot industry chain are accelerating improvements. Among these, major advances have been made in the localization of core components. Green Harmonic Drive Systems Co., Ltd. The localization velocity of the harmonic reducer produced by (688017.SH) reached 25%. In the first half of 2025, revenue was 251 million yuan, with a gross profit margin of 34.77%. Keli Sensing Co., Ltd. (603662.sh) has deployed nearly 20 types of robot sensors, with the measurement error of the 6-axis force sensor being less than 1%. The company's revenue for the first half of the year was 685 million yuan, an increase of 23.4% per year. Beit Automotive Co., Ltd. (603009.SH) achieved fine grinding accuracy of ±0.001mm in the field of planetary roller screws. Localization of core components reduced the overall machine BOM cost by 30-40%, laying the foundation for commercialization.
Among the machine manufacturers, Estun Automation Co., Ltd. (002747.SZ) 31° – Freedom Robot has a market share of 23% in the medical exoskeleton field, earnings of 2.549 billion yuan in the first half. Midea Group Co., Ltd. (000333.SZ) sent the robot to Jingzhou Factory to participate in combination with “embodied intelligence algorithms + Kuka hardware” and standardized operations such as equipment maintenance and material processing. Fourier GR-3 focuses on home services and plans to enter an offline store later in the year to provide services.
Technically, Unitree Robotics' H1 robots have significantly increased the degree of freedom and increased movement flexibility. Orbbec's 3D Vision sensors can model complex environments and significantly improve accuracy. These advances in technology have initially validated application values for robots in scenarios such as industrial manufacturing and logistics sorting.
However, despite progress, the industry still faces major challenges. Core components such as high-end sensors and high-performance motors still rely on imports. The accuracy of robot movement in complex environments is less than 90% and has not yet reached industrial standards. Additionally, although some components have been replaced domestically, the unit cost of humanoid robots remains at 199,000 yuan, making it affordable for most families. As Soochow Securities noted, global sales of humanoid robots in 2025 were less than 30,000 units, and is still expected to be far from massive adoption.
03 Integration and Breakthrough: Commercialization Path of AI + Humanoid Robots
Amidst the challenge, the deep integration of humanoid robots and AI technology is becoming an important force for moving the industry forward. On the other hand, large AI models create more powerful decision-making-abilities in humanoid robots. Humanoid robots, meanwhile, offer a career to interact with the physical world. The two synergistic effects open a closed loop of “Recognition-Decision-Execution”.
When it comes to technical integration, large-scale models such as Tencent's Hunyuan Turbos have doubled the efficiency of inference, allowing robots to handle complex tasks more quickly. The large multimodal model has enhanced the robot's ability to understand the environment, allowing multiple types of information, such as vision and voice, to be processed simultaneously. Companies such as Huawei and Midea are actively investigating the path of “embodied intelligence” by incorporating AI algorithms deep into robotic hardware.
However, to truly enable AI technology and humanoid robots to benefit humanity, the following issues need to be solved: First, accelerated domestic replacement of components. Currently, the localization rate of core components in humanoid robots is generally low, with 25% for harmonic reducers, 15% for planetary roller screws, and 10% for six-axis force sensors. With increased policy support and capital investment, the localization rate of core components is expected to exceed 50% by 2027. Companies such as Green Harmonic Drive Systems and Kerisensing are accelerating technical research to help the industry cut costs.
Second, large-scale mass production is required. Goldman Sachs predicts that the combined annual growth rate for global humanoid robot sales will reach 94% from 2025 to 2035, based on achieving “tens of thousands of units” of mass production. Tesla's Optimus Mass Production sets a benchmark for the industry, and domestic manufacturers such as UBTECH Robotics (9880.HK) and Unitree Robotics are actively deploying it. As production increases, the scale effect significantly reduces unit costs.
Finally, it is important to focus on humanoid robot scenarios and value verification. Industrial scenarios with high standardization and clear ROI have become the first area where humanoid robots have been implemented. The application of Midea's robots at the Jingzhou Factory proves its value in scenarios such as equipment maintenance and material handling. In the future, costs will be reduced and as technology advances, scenarios such as home services and medical rehabilitation will gradually expand.
Going forward, deep integration of humanoid robots and AI applications will create new business models and industrial ecosystems. CITIC Securities believes that 2025 will be the year of mass production of humanoid robots, and the industry will enter a period of rapid development. CITIC Construction Investment points out that the main investment line of AI should revolve around “computing power as a foundation, self-control as an inevitable trend, and the rise of agents and B-end applications.”
While the industry still faces challenges in terms of technology maturity, cost management, data privacy and ethical regulations, the great potential presented by humanoid robots and AI applications has achieved a high level of consensus in the capital market. As Goldman Sachs predicts, by 2035, the global humanoid robot market is expected to reach $38 billion or $154 billion.
2025 may be the beginning of a great era that transforms science fiction into reality. For investors, companies with rapid commercialization of large-scale AI models, core component enterprises that have joined the supply chains of Tesla and UBTECH, and machine manufacturers with full industrial chain capabilities, could potentially share the dividends of this technology wave.
This article is from WeChat's official account, Investor Network – Thinking Finance. Author: Wu Wei. Reissue by 36kr with permission.
