Alibaba Group Holding’s artificial intelligence and cloud computing services unit recently led a 1 billion yuan (US$140 million) Series A+ funding round for X Square Robot, a Shenzhen-based developer of embodied intelligence models.
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The deal marked Alibaba Cloud’s first investment in the embodied intelligence field, according to a statement on Monday from X Square Robot. The start-up said it expected “multidimensional support” from the Hangzhou-based company. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.
Other firms that took part in the start-up’s latest financing round were CAS Investment, China Development Bank Capital and HongShan Capital Group, as well as existing investors that include food delivery giant Meituan and Legend Capital.
The funding raised “will be used for the continued training of our fully self-developed embodied intelligence foundation models and for the iterative development of our hardware products”, X Square Robot said.
The growing investor interest in embodied intelligence, also known as embodied AI that drives robotics, reflects the rapid advances being made by China’s humanoid robot makers, who have entered mass production this year.
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Humanoid robots show impressive moves at world conference in Beijing
Humanoid robots show impressive moves at world conference in Beijing
Robotics start-ups have become sought-after investment targets, as China develops a humanoid robot supply chain that could quickly deploy these machines in factories and homes.