One of China's largest premium car dealers, Yongda Automobile, has agreed with UBTECH Robotics to purchase 400 U1 Pro humanoid robots. UBTECH announced this on 11 November, and deliveries are promised to be completed within 2026 year. Curiously, Yongda was already among the first recipients of robots from the new U1 series: according to the company, deliveries began on 16 September.
This is not only about selling. The parties signed a strategic agreement under which they will jointly develop sales and applied scenarios for the robots, as well as experience and delivery services and joint work with data. In Shanghai, the partners intend to build a UBTECH exhibition and demonstration center that will bring together displays, interactivity, customer work and demonstrations of commercial scenarios.
Inside the showrooms, the robots will act not as workers but as a showcase and a conversation partner: demonstrating capabilities, assisting in sales and serving visitors. For Shanghai-based Yongda, this is a test of whether such a format can be turned into a repeatable sales and service model.
The scale of the network matters here. Yongda has more than 150 showrooms in 48 cities, and if 400 machines are divided equally, each showroom would get 2–3 robots. Journalists who analyzed the deal concluded that most of the devices will become exhibits and a traffic-attraction tool, and only the units actually sold will generate profit.
The financial side also deserves attention. The retail price of the U1 Pro is about 169 800 yuan, so a batch of 400 machines at list price comes to roughly 67,9 million yuan. The exact terms of the contract have not been disclosed, so the final sum may differ. For comparison: Yongda has about 2,2 billion yuan in cash on its balance sheet, and interest-bearing debt of almost 4 billion.
UBTECH is betting on emotional communication. The U1 Pro has 88 degrees of freedom, expressive facial features and biomimetic silicone skin. The capabilities of the model itself are a matter of debate: some sources write that it can stand, sit and walk on flat indoor surfaces, while others claim that the Pro does not move independently and that autonomous movement is demonstrated in the higher-end Ultra version. Therefore, before judging the product's "liveliness," it is worth waiting for independent demonstrations.
The context of the deal is the rapid growth of UBTECH's business. Revenue from full-size humanoids in 2025 amounted to 820,6 million yuan, and in the first half of 2026 — 590,3 million yuan with 921 robot sold. The company, however, remains loss-making: its net loss for 2025 reached 789,8 million yuan. For such a player, reliable sales channels are especially important.
UBTECH brought the U1 line to market on 30 June 2026 in Shenzhen and reported 13 361 orders at launch. At the same time, the company signed a three-year agreement with a China Telecom division to sell 100 thousand robots, which means retail partners are already lining up.
Ultimately, the deal is interesting not so much for its size as for its test of demand: can a robot that is sold as a conversation partner rather than as a worker consistently bring in money in showrooms? For customers, this promises livelier interaction with technology, and for the industry, a clear signal that embodied AI is gradually moving out of laboratories into ordinary retail.
