Interviews
Conversations with founders, researchers and engineers.
Huawei Veteran Zhou Shunbo’s New Home Robot Startup Secures Hundreds of Millions in Funding
Zhou Shunbo, founder of Ou La Wan Xiang, discusses his journey from Huawei to creating a wheeled home robot. He argues that data is the first principle of embodied AI and believes that high-value, non-AGI-dependent robots can succeed in family scenarios.
INTACT: Search-Free World Model for Robotics Achieves Faster, More Reliable Control
Researchers propose INTACT, a search-free world model framework that aligns physical and goal intentions using a shared operator. Achieving 95.33% success rate with 300x faster inference than LeWM, it upgrades JEPA from prediction to deployable control.
D-Robotics Unveils 0.04B X-Lens for Real-Time Depth Estimation on Heterogeneous Cameras
D-Robotics, in collaboration with Tokyo University and Suzhou University, released a technical report on July 15 introducing X-Lens, a lightweight depth estimation model with only 0.04B parameters. Capable of real-time metric depth estimation with heterogeneous cameras on edge devices, X-Lens uses a 'ray space' approach to unify fisheye and pinhole camera inputs, achieving high accuracy and efficiency compared to larger models.
GigaAI and Tsinghua University Release GigaWorld-1 to Use World Models as Robot Evaluators
As physical evaluation bottlenecks slow down embodied foundation model iteration, GigaAI and Tsinghua University release GigaWorld-1, using world models as evaluators to reduce reliance on real-world robot testing. Xiaofeng Wang discusses how this approach can accelerate development cycles.
Physical Intelligence bets on cloud-based AI to make one model control all robots
Physical Intelligence's co-founder Quan Vuong discusses the robot 'ChatGPT moment', data bottlenecks, and cloud-based deployment strategies in a recent YC podcast interview.
Physical Intelligence Is Valued at RMB 38.5 Billion Without Making Robots—Its Bet Is on an Operating-System-Like Platform
Physical Intelligence (PI) reached a $5.6 billion valuation by providing models to other robot teams rather than building robot hardware. Co-founder Sergey Levine discusses real-world data and the data flywheel, weak supervision through language annotations, an operating-system-like foundation for diverse robot hardware, and the role of mid-level reasoning.
Embodied AI firm Galaxea raises nearly RMB 2 billion in B+ round, valuation exceeds RMB 20 billion
Embodied AI company Galaxea announced the completion of a nearly 2 billion RMB B+ round of financing. With cumulative financing approaching 5 billion RMB, its valuation has broken through 20 billion RMB, making it one of the few members of the '20 Billion Club' in China's embodied AI industry.
Figure CEO predicts robot industry consolidation into few giants, claims two-year lead
Figure CEO Brett Adcock discusses the necessity of closed-loop control, vertical integration, and mass production in his first comprehensive interview since releasing the Helix 2 model.
D-Robotics' Hu Chunxu: Compute Must Match the Application—More Is Not Always Better
At the DDC 2025 D-Robotics Developer Conference, Vice President of Developer Ecosystem Hu Chunxu discussed the balance between computing power and cost, the distinction between AI Infra and Robot Infra, and D-Robotics' strategy of securing its core business while exploring future growth in an era where robots may number in the hundreds of millions.
Figure Founder Brett Adcock: We Lead Other Robot Companies by 1 to 2 Years
At Dreamforce, Figure founder Brett Adcock discussed the path to embodied AI, emphasizing that true intelligence, not manufacturing, is the core challenge. He predicts humanoid robots will complete general tasks via voice commands next year and argues humanoid forms will dominate due to scalability and training data advantages.
Vbot Co-founder: Vbot Production Starts in October, 30,000-50,000 Units Shipped Next Year
At the inaugural Aggregated Intelligence Industry Development Conference (2025) in Wuhan, Vbot co-founder Zhelun Zhao shared updates on their first product, Vbot. The quadruped robot will begin production in October, with consumer sales following after a rigorous trial phase. Zhao projects shipments of 30,000-50,000 units next year and aims for a 60% market share in the consumer quadruped segment by 2026.
ZhiXing Tech's Zhang Hanwen: Autonomous Charging Robots and L4 Driving to Converge, 2028 Mass Production Target
Zhang Hanwen, General Manager of the Robot Business Unit at ZhiXing Tech, discusses the technological synergy between autonomous driving and embodied AI, highlighting the company's advancements in charging robots and the prediction that L4 autonomous driving and mass-produced charging robots will arrive simultaneously by 2028.