Ex-DJI and Anker exec Liu Liyuan launches pet-companion robot with Yuanhe-led angel

LeiPhone has learned that Liu Liyuan, a former core product lead at DJI and Anker, has started a venture in pet-companion robots and closed an angel round led by Yuanhe. The move takes a seasoned Shenzhen hardware operator into one of consumer robotics’ most emotionally sticky niches. A pet-companion robot, the new bet from ex-DJI … Read more

LimX Dynamics closes $200M Pre-IPO round, valuation reaches 15 billion yuan

General-purpose humanoid robot maker LimX Dynamics has closed a Pre-IPO financing round of nearly 200 million US dollars, lifting its post-money valuation to 15 billion yuan and putting it among China’s super unicorns. The company has raised 400 million US dollars across the past six months, building a war chest for its next capital-market move. … Read more

Robotaxi rivalry shifts from cars to cities as Shenzhen takes on Los Angeles

The robotaxi industry has entered a new phase. In 2026, Waymo’s ride volume in San Francisco overtook Lyft at times. In China, Baidu’s Apollo Go completed 3.2 million rides in the first quarter, up more than 120 per cent year on year. Global private investment in autonomous driving reached 23.3 billion dollars in the first … Read more

How Li Zexiang built a 50 billion dollar startup factory around Shenzhen

Li Zexiang is best known outside China as the mentor who discovered Wang Tao, the founder of DJI. Inside the Greater Bay Area, he is something closer to an institution. The article, a reporter’s notebook from Shenzhen News, says his Songshan Lake XbotPark robot base has incubated 287 companies, including 13 unicorns or near-unicorns with … Read more

US robot builders are stuffing Chinese parts into suitcases to get around Washington’s ban

On 28 July 2026, the United States Federal Communications Commission added advanced foreign-made robots to its restricted-equipment list. The practical effect was to block new Chinese humanoid robots from entering the US market. The gap between the rule and reality is now being filled by rolling suitcases in Shenzhen. Suitcase shopping in Huaqiangbei has become … Read more

Shenzhen robotics: LimX put 50 students on full-size humanoids for five days

Six hundred students applied. Fifty got five days on a full-size humanoid robot in Shenzhen. The LimX Dynamics Developer Camp 2026 closed on 7 August, guided by the Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Industry and Information Technology and the Shenzhen Qianhai Authority, and run with D-Robotics, Alibaba Cloud, RealSense and PICO. More than 600 students from … Read more

Shenzhen robotics: DJI’s RoboMaster has trained 200,000 engineers in 11 years

Nearly 200,000 engineers have come through one robotics competition in Shenzhen. Over a thousand of them now work at DJI. RoboMaster 2026 wrapped in Shenzhen on 9 August. Northeastern University’s TDT team took the title. South China Agricultural University’s Taurus finished second, East China University of Science and Technology’s Origin third and Tongji University’s SuperPower … Read more