Just through mid-May, China-based robotics companies this year have raised $5.6 billion across 176 deals, Crunchbase data shows. That sum matches total investment to the nation's robotics companies in all of 2021, the peak of the funding cycle. Investment in the sector has also already eclipsed the $4.3 billion raised by China-based robotics companies in all of 2025. Startup funding in Asia overall surged to $27.4 billion in Q1, its highest level in over three years, with China capturing $16.5 billion ' 60% ' of that total, according to recent Crunchbase data. Robotics contributed meaningfully to that $16.5 billion total, with startups in the sector raising $3.3 billion across 126 deals. A review of Crunchbase data shows that investors now are no longer funding mostly pre-programmed hardware, but increasingly backing China-based startups working on embodied AI ' or artificial intelligence with a physical body that interacts with the real world in real time. That shift toward...
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