Yushu Technology IPO: Human-shaped robot profit margins decline, nearly half of the fundraising to补“brain”shortcomings

Source: Securities Star

During the key period when the industrialization of humanoid robots is reaching an inflection point, Unitree Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter “Unitree Technology”) has knocked on the door of the capital markets. At present, the company’s Sci-Tech Innovation Board IPO has been completed in terms of the Exchange’s pre-review, and it has disclosed two rounds of inquiry response letters.

Unitree Technology has attracted more than 40 investment parties to take equity positions. In the most recent round of financing, the post-investment valuation reached RMB 12.7 billion, and founder Wang Xingxing firmly retains control of the company through a special voting rights arrangement. With the company’s performance growing explosively, humanoid robots have overtaken quadruped robots to become the company’s primary source of revenue. However, beneath the high growth, concerns have already begun to emerge. Although the company’s core product, G1, has swept the market with a value-for-money strategy, it has lowered the gross margin of humanoid robots from 87.67% to 62.91%.

Securities Star has noticed that Unitree Technology’s deeper challenge lies in the commercialization of its technology. More than 70% of the company’s humanoid robot revenue comes from the scientific research and education sector, and there is still a considerable gap before entering real industrial and household scenarios. In particular, at the “brain” layer—which determines the level of robot intelligence—the company’s core technology reserve remains at an early stage. Therefore, in this IPO, nearly half of Unitree Technology’s fund-raising will be devoted to “brain”-related R&D. For this company, which started from the “body,” whether it can close the gap in the “brain” while racing at high speed in valuation and performance is the focus of market attention.

01． Wang Xingxing holds control rights

The prospectus shows that Unitree Technology’s predecessor was established in August 2016 with funding from Wang Xingxing, with registered capital of RMB 100,000.

Since 2022, Unitree Technology has accelerated its pace of fundraising. After completing the fourth round of capital increases within the year in August 2022, the company’s valuation was raised to around RMB 1.12 billion, without showing any clear jump. In 2023, the company did not add any external financing during the full year. In 2024, Unitree Technology entered the valuation range of RMB 3.0 billion, with total valuations generally between RMB 3.0 billion and RMB 4.0 billion.

Entering 2025, Unitree Technology’s valuation saw a substantial uplift. The valuation level corresponding to equity transactions during the year showed a significant jump, and the company therefore received inquiries from the Shanghai Stock Exchange. Unitree Technology explained that the two batches of equity changes before the company’s 2025 filing had valuation differences, mainly because the interval between deal negotiations and the formal signing date was relatively long.

Looking at the timeline, Unitree Technology completed a B3 round of financing in September 2024, with a post-investment valuation of RMB 3.785 billion. In May–June 2025, there were six transactions in total involving equity transfers and capital increases. Of these, the three equity transfers in May were actually concluded around the end of 2024, and the valuation range was between RMB 5.0 billion and RMB 5.8 billion. After that, the company completed a C round financing in June 2025 with a pre-investment valuation of RMB 12.0 billion. The post-investment valuation for this round was RMB 12.7 billion.

In other words, Unitree Technology’s total valuation increased from the post-investment valuation of RMB 3.785 billion in September 2024 to around the beginning of 2025, up 0.53x to between RMB 5.0 billion and RMB 5.8 billion, and then increased by about 1.1x to RMB 12.7 billion in June 2025.

At present, including Meituan, Sequoia China, Matrix Partners, Tencent Technology, Alibaba Group, Geely Automobile, and others, more than 40 investment parties hold stakes in Unitree Technology through direct or indirect means. Among them, Meituan is the second-largest shareholder. The Meituan-affiliated parties Hanhai Information, GalaxyZ, and Chengdu Longzhu form a concerted-action relationship, with combined shareholding of 9.65%.

Although there are many shareholders, Wang Xingxing still holds absolute control, directly and indirectly controlling 34.76% of the shares in total. By setting up a special voting rights arrangement, Wang Xingxing has a combined voting rights share of 68.78%. After this issuance, the proportion of voting rights will fall to no more than 65.31%. Under the special voting rights mechanism, Wang Xingxing has decisive influence over decisions at Unitree Technology.

Securities Star notes that, in order to mitigate the risk of misuse of voting rights, Unitree Technology has put in place multiple constraint mechanisms. Through measures such as clearly limiting the scope of authority of special voting rights, ensuring after listing that the proportion of special voting rights will not be higher than the original level, leveraging independent directors’ supervisory functions, and requiring holders of special voting rights shares to make commitments, the company has comprehensively regulated and imposed necessary restrictions on the exercise of special voting rights after listing. However, whether the institutional design can balance the stability of control rights with the rights and interests of minority shareholders still needs to be tested over time.

02． Hidden concerns behind high growth

The prospectus shows that Unitree Technology focuses on the R&D, production, and sales of high-performance general-purpose humanoid robots, quadruped robots, robot components, and embodied intelligence model projects. The company’s main operating revenue consists of two categories of products: quadruped robots and humanoid robots.

From 2022 to 2024, Unitree Technology respectively achieved revenue of RMB 123 million, RMB 159 million, and RMB 392 million, with a compound growth rate of 78.66%. Corresponding attributable net profits were RMB -22.10 million, RMB -11.1451 million, and RMB 94.5018 million. In 2024, it turned from loss to profit.

In 2025, Unitree Technology maintained high growth, achieving revenue of RMB 1.708 billion, up 335.36% year over year. Attributable net profit was RMB 288 million, up 204.29% year over year. Net profit after excluding non-recurring items was RMB 600 million, up 674.29% year over year. The main reason was the rapid growth in product sales volume. In early spring of 2025, its Spring Festival Gala performance and the honor of being rated “Hangzhou Six Little Dragons” greatly increased Unitree Technology’s brand awareness, boosting the company’s 2025 Q2 revenue with a large increase both quarter over quarter and year over year.

Unitree Technology’s revenue mix has shifted from quadruped robots to humanoid robots. As of the end of September 2025, the revenue share of humanoid robots rose to 51.53%, first exceeding that of quadruped robots.

However, this structural shift is not entirely good news. Contrary to the steadily rising gross margin of quadruped robots, the gross margin of humanoid robots fell from 87.67% in 2023 to 62.91% at the end of the third quarter of 2025, a drop of nearly 25 percentage points. But benefited by a significant decrease in unit costs, the overall gross margin still increased. For 2022 to 2024 and the first three quarters of 2025 (hereinafter “the reporting period”), the gross margin of the main business was 44.18%, 44.22%, 56.41%, and 59.45%, respectively.

Securities Star notes that the decline in the gross margin of humanoid robots is due to product-structure adjustments. The company’s humanoid robot product models mainly include H1, G1, H1-2, and others. Among them, G1’s unit price and gross margin are relatively low. The sales volume of this product surged from 257 units in 2024 to 3,395 units in the first three quarters of 2025, becoming the main factor behind the growth in humanoid robot revenue. Taking the first three quarters of 2025 as an example, the gross margins of H1 and G1 were 66.74% and 61.45%, respectively. In the same period, G1 accounted for 88.9% of sales revenue of humanoid robots. The growth in G1 revenue, to some extent, dragged down the overall gross margin and unit price of humanoid robots.

Low-priced volume-driving G1 has become the absolute mainstay of humanoid robot revenue. However, a lower gross margin makes it difficult to support the stable profitability level of the core business. If future growth continues to rely on such low-priced products, whether its gross margin levels can be safeguarded will be an issue that cannot be ignored.

Unitree Technology also mentions in its prospectus the risk of “higher revenue growth rates alongside a decline in gross margin level.” If in the future changes occur such as intensified industry market competition, technology upgrades, or product iterations, the company may face an even more complex operating environment.

03． A commercialization dilemma under “technology specialization”

The overall functional structure of general-purpose robots is usually likened to three parts: the “body,” the “brain,” and the “cerebellum.” Among them, “the brain” is typically a comparison for cognitive intelligence for general-purpose robots and embodied large models. Unitree Technology’s core advantage lies in the robot’s “body capabilities.” This ensures that before intelligence from the upper-layer AI “brain” arrives, the company can rely on top-tier “hardware” to gain an advantage in the market.

Most of Unitree Technology’s core technologies and in-development projects are related to the “cerebellum” and “body,” and the technologies or projects involving embodied large models are still in the “basic research” stage. The data show that among the 12 core technologies listed by the company, only one relates to the “brain,” corresponding to one authorized invention patent. At present, it is still in the R&D stage.

In terms of R&D, during the reporting period, Unitree Technology’s R&D expense ratios were 24.39%, 31.39%, 17.84%, and 7.73%, respectively. The decline in its R&D expense ratio is mainly due to revenue growth far exceeding the reasonable growth rate of R&D expenses. In 2024, R&D expense ratios for comparable companies in the same industry—U-blox? (09880.HK) and Yezhi (02432.HK)—were 36.63% and 19.21%, respectively.

Securities Star notes that high-performance general-purpose robots, as one of the most complex and cutting-edge sub-sectors in the robotics field, still requires solving multiple technical challenges for large-scale applications in industrial and household settings. For Unitree Technology, this is a true “commercialization” test. As of the end of September 2025, in the revenue composition of humanoid robots, more than 70% of revenue is used in scientific research and education; revenues from commercial consumption and industry applications account for less than 30%.

Because the application scenarios remain mostly in the research domain, the Shanghai Stock Exchange requires Unitree Technology to explain what key milestones still need to be overcome for the products to reach large-scale commercialization. The company responded that for large-scale commercialization in industrial and household scenarios, the key technical issues to be overcome mainly include two aspects: embodied large-model capabilities at the “brain” level, and the fine precision and durability of the “dexterous hands.” Among these, the most important technical challenge is that embodied large models worldwide are still in the early stage of development, and generalization capabilities are insufficient.

In the first round of inquiry responses, Unitree Technology candidly admitted that, since the global humanoid robot field’s “brain” technology route is currently in a phase of rapid development exploration, no mature technical consensus has been formed within the industry. At present, there is no formed technical iteration relationship, and the various technical routes—and global industry companies including the company—have not yet experienced complete application scenarios and commercialization validation.

Therefore, in this IPO fund-raising projects, Unitree Technology is placing a strong bet on the “brain.” Of the funds raised, RMB 2.022 billion will be invested in an intelligent robot model R&D project, accounting for 48.13% of the total fund-raising amount—making it the single largest investment project. The project’s actual focus is mainly on technology R&D related to the “brain” level, covering multiple “brain”-level technical steps and areas, including model development, data collection, and model training. (This article was first published by Securities Star. Author | Lu Weny an.)

- End -

A massive amount of information and precise analysis—only on the Sina Finance app

Editor: Yang Hongbo