Unitree stock closed at 845 yuan on Wednesday after Unitree Robotics made its Shanghai stock market debut and ended the first day of trading up by more than 460%. The shares were offered at 150.80 yuan each, giving investors a first look at how aggressively mainland China is valuing humanoid robotics.
845 yuan on Star Market
845 yuan was the closing price after the offer price of 150.80 yuan, a jump that leaves the stock far above its listing level on Star Market. For investors, that gap is the immediate signal: demand in the opening session was far stronger than the initial pricing assumed.
2025 brought 278 million yuan in net profit for Unitree, while last year the company shipped more than 5,500 humanoid robots. The combination matters because this is not a pure concept story; it is a maker of sensors, automated arms, four-legged machines and human-like machines that is already generating cash, even as much of the humanoid robotics field is still spending heavily to build scale.
Fei Qin on AI and ageing
Fei Qin, an associate professor at the University of Bath, said robots are seen as a potential solution to China's ageing population and added: "Robots are where AI leaves the screen and enters the economy". That framing puts the listing in practical terms for buyers and investors: the market is not just paying for hardware, but for machines that can move from demonstration into factories, hospitals and the home.
Harold Soh, a researcher from the National University of Singapore, said US robots tend to have more user-friendly software but Chinese manufacturers offer lower prices. Unitree, officially known as Yushu Technology Co Ltd and based in Hangzhou, is one of the few companies in the sector to make money, while Tesla, BYD and Amazon are developing two-legged machines capable of performing tasks usually carried out by people.
2016 to Wednesday in Shanghai
2016 was the year Unitree was founded, and Wednesday's debut made it the first mainland China stock market listing by a Chinese humanoid robot maker. China Daily has said the number of Chinese robotics firms increased by more than threefold from 2020 to 2024, helped by government support in eastern China, and the latest listing adds a public-market price to that growth story.
Investors and the broader robotics sector now have the clearest reference point yet for how mainland China is pricing a profitable humanoid robot maker. The unanswered issue is the scale of the capital raised in the Shanghai IPO and the valuation implied by the deal, which will determine how much room Unitree has to fund the next phase of expansion.
