Unitree Robotics, China’s first publicly traded humanoid robot manufacturer, made a spectacular debut on Shanghai Stock Exchange Science and Technology Innovation Board on August 19th, 2026, with its shares skyrocketing 629.44 percent at the opening bell. The Hangzhou-based company, trading under the symbol 688836.SH, opened at 1,100.00 yuan per share, compared with its Initial Public Offering (IPO) price of 150.80 yuan, pushing its total market capitalization to 444.90 billion yuan (approximately $66.00 billion). The blockbuster listing, which drew record retail demand, has been hailed as a defining moment for China’s fast-growing humanoid robotics industry, establishing a valuation benchmark for the sector.
Unitree’s IPO pricing had already signaled strong investor confidence, with the company raising approximately 6.10 billion yuan in gross proceeds from the offering of 40.45 million shares. The offering was massively oversubscribed, with retail demand exceeding available shares by more than 8,000.00 times – a record for the Shanghai Stock Exchange Science and Technology Innovation Board. The online subscription rate was just 0.0181 percent, the lowest ever for a Shanghai Stock Exchange Science and Technology Innovation Board listing, making it the most difficult new share to secure in the market’s history. For investors fortunate enough to secure a standard allotment of 500 shares, the paper gain at the opening price exceeded 470,000.00 yuan per lot. The IPO attracted prominent strategic backers including Chinese AI company DeepSeek and tech giant Tencent.
Unitree, founded in 2016, has established itself as a global leader in high-performance general-purpose robotics. The company’s product lineup spans bipedal humanoid robots capable of walking and manipulating objects with dexterous hands, as well as four-legged robots used for industrial tasks such as hazard detection. By the end of July 2026, Unitree had produced and delivered approximately 18,000 bipedal humanoid robots across different models. The company’s revenue has grown from 159.00 million yuan in 2023 to 1.69 billion yuan in 2025, with humanoid robots surpassing quadruped robots as its largest revenue source. For the first half of 2026, Unitree reported operating revenue of 1.15 billion yuan, up 48.54 percent year-on-year.
The scale of Unitree’s first-day jump – one of the largest ever for a technology IPO in China – underscores the intense investor appetite for companies at the intersection of artificial intelligence and robotics. The stock’s opening valuation of 444.90 billion yuan represents roughly 35.90 times the company’s 2025 sales and 219.00 times its earnings, far exceeding the industry average of 38.56 times. Industry analysts view the listing as a pivotal moment that will allow investors to compare robot makers more directly on technology, product maturity, commercialization, and profitability. The IPO proceeds are primarily allocated to research and development, including intelligent robot model development, hardware research and development (R&D), new product development, and manufacturing base construction. Just a day before Unitree’s debut, laser maker Precilasers also surged more than 500.00 percent on its Shanghai Stock Exchange Science and Technology Innovation Board debut, reflecting a broader shift in Chinese investor sentiment toward hard-tech companies with high technological barriers. For Unitree, the question now is whether it can grow into its extraordinary valuation through scaling industrial orders and sustained technological leadership.