(Wired) – Explosive acceleration, limited dexterity, eyes in the back of its head. What could possibly go wrong?

Perhaps no humanoid maker has a bigger lead than a Hangzhou-based company called Unitree. While Elon Musk’s Optimus staggers through its demos, Unitree’s robots are doing sprints, kung-fu kicks, and acrobatic backflips. (The conference’s dancing door greeter was a Unitree.) Unitree’s legged robots are also incredibly cheap, costing tens of thousands of dollars or less, a tenth of what a typical humanoid in the US costs. Unitree is China’s most prominent robotics startup, a national champion for its tech industry, and is reportedly targeting a $7 billion IPO listing in Shanghai. And if Unitree fails? A staggering 200-plus other Chinese companies are also developing humanoids, which recently prompted the Chinese government to warn of overcapacity and unnecessary replication. The US has about 16 prominent firms building humanoids. (Read More)