China: Robots box and dance at Beijing's 2026 World Robot Conference

More than 300 companies are displaying humanoid robots, industrial machines, service robots and other forms of embodied artificial intelligence at the Beijing's 2026 World Robot Conference. The five-day event kicked off on August 19, coinciding with Unitree's stock-market debut. The company, China's best-known humanoid robot maker, saw shares increase nearly six-fold on opening day. The conference comes as robotics emerges as a new front in the US-China rivalry.