UBTECH Looks Beyond Industry With China Telecom Partnership

SHENZHEN, China -- Shenzhen-based humanoid robot maker UBTECH Robotics seeks to broaden its reach into consumer and business markets via a partnership with Tianyi Telecom Terminal, a unit of China Telecom, for distribution of robots and new uses of the technology.

The two firms inked a strategic pact Nov. 9 to work together on robot sales, leasing arrangements, demonstrations at stores and collaborative product development.

Tianyi Telecom Terminal, which manages device distribution and collaborations with suppliers, benefits from the national network of stores and customers maintained by China Telecom.

The collaboration may help UBTECH tap customers outside of the markets where it is already present without building its own distribution network.

The partners hope to investigate centralized purchasing of robots, leasing the technology and bundling artificial intelligence (AI) services and robot hardware. They also want to experiment with robot demonstrations at telecom retail locations, enabling consumers to try out the technology prior to buying or leasing it.

Among their three-year goals are supporting sales of more than one million units in China's household companion robot segment as well as 100,000 highly realistic and wheeled humanoid robots.

These numbers reflect wider market development goals rather than firm orders for UBTECH products. Neither company disclosed any financial obligations, binding order quantities, nor roll-out schedule.

Development of Robots for New Customers

As part of the partnership, the two firms announced the creation of a new robotics innovation laboratory aimed at application discovery, product customization, performance testing, and establishing technical standards.

The idea is to combine robotic voice interaction, visual recognition, and emotion recognition capabilities with cloud infrastructure, AI algorithms, connectivity, and security offered by China Telecom.

The innovation laboratory will pay attention to household companionship and commercial services applications, which have different requirements than industrial use cases.

UBTECH has already developed most of its humanoid robot business in the context of manufacturing and professional applications. As shown in the company's financial statements, in the first half of 2026, full-size embodied AI humanoids were responsible for 46.5% of its revenues.

The company is currently selling robots to other industries, but making it available to house owners will need the provision of low-cost robots that can operate efficiently.

China Telecom has retail outlets and good relations with the customers that can help in fulfilling these needs.

Nevertheless, there are no details provided by the agreement about the specific robot model to be sold, its price, and the time when the sale and lease of robots will start.