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Unitree stuns the market with huge price drop: The Chinese robotics company has unveiled its R1 humanoid robot for just $5,900, dramatically undercutting competitors in the race to bring multipurpose humanoids to the masses. While American rivals like Tesla’s Optimus ($20K) and Figure’s 02 ($50K) talk about affordability in the future, Unitree is shipping now. The timing is strategic as well — the company, last week, filed paperwork for what could be the first humanoid robotics IPO on a Chinese exchange.
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Waymo hits a major milestone in the US: The company just crossed the 100M fully autonomous miles mark. It now provides over a quarter million rides weekly across four cities, having doubled its mileage in just 6 months while planning to expand to new locations in Miami, D.C., and Tokyo. Waymo has also tripled its Austin service area in a likely attempt to fend off emerging competition from Tesla. This milestone is yet another sign that the robotaxi market is only going to expand in the coming years.
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UBTech’s new self-charging robot is built for 24/7 shifts: The Chinese robot maker has unveiled Walker S2, the world’s first humanoid robot that can swap its own batteries without human help. This latest innovation solves a major bottleneck for industrial automation — robots can now work around the clock in truly non-stop shifts, potentially eliminating one of the last advantages human workers had over robotic ones. Here’s a video of the Walker S2 swapping out its own battery.