China created a humanoid robot cheaper than your cell phone

A Chinese startup has managed to dramatically reduce its robot production costs through in-house hardware design, lightweight materials and an entirely national supply chain.

The Chinese startup is challenging ideas about how much a humanoid robot should cost.

Shortly after raising around $41 million in a funding round, the company revealed how it managed to design its Bumi home robot so that it can be sold for just 9,998 Yuan — about 1,210 euros.

This price, the equivalent of an iPhone 17 Pro Max in China, puts the robot directly in the consumer electronics segment, that is, Bumi positions himself next to high-end smartphonespremium laptops and headphones, and well away from the price ranges normally associated with humanoid robots.

At 94 centimeters tall, the robot already registers a strong demand. According to Noetix, more than 100 units were sold within the first hour of release, and the first 500 sold out in just two days.

The price is particularly notable given that full-size humanoid robots in the US and other markets typically cost between 30 and 100 times more, what makes them inaccessible to the common consumernote or .

Although not designed for industrial tasks or as an automated home system, Bumi moves and interacts like a humanoidbeing thought of as a social companion and learning platform.

This approach represents a paradigm shift for the sector. Instead of betting on expensive technological advances that take robots away from the mass market, Noetix is ​​focusing, for now, on making robotics more accessible and useful to the real public.

Engineering with cost first

Noetix attributes its record price to rethinking the key cost drivers of humanoid robotics. Founder Jiang Zheyuan explained what the team focused on three fundamental aspects of design and production to achieve this value.

The first is the vertical integration. Instead of purchasing control boards and motor controllers from external suppliers — a common practice that makes the product more expensive and limits optimization — the company develops these critical modules in-house. So, you can better align performance between hardware and software and eliminate intermediary margins.

The second aspect is the structural redesign. The company opted for composite materials, reinforced with metal only where necessary. This decision reduced the total weight to just 12 kilosmuch less than most existing humanoids.

This lighter structure allowed the use of smaller motors and more compact batteries, generating a chain reduction in costs across the entire mechanical system.

Ultimately, Noetix built a supply chain almost entirely internal, with almost 100% of components, including enginessensors and Rockchip processors from Chinese suppliers.

This strategy takes advantage of China’s industrial densityreducing logistical delays and accelerating iteration cycles — crucial factors in a sector that is still evolving quickly.

Designed for classrooms and living rooms

Bumi was designed mainly for education and entertainment. Its size was intentionally chosen to avoid the “uncanny valley”the so-called “uncanny valley” among younger children, while remaining appropriate for real home and school environments.

Noetix intends to introduce the robot as interaction, learning tool and experimentation, before gradually expanding the concept of humanoid to more general assistance functions.

The robot supports open programming interfaces, a sign that the company intends create a community of programmers around Bumitreating it as a participatory platform and not as a simple closed gadget.

Humanoid robotics could be entering a new era of cost reduction. If the momentum continues, robots that once seemed like distant prototypes could become products within reach of everyday consumers — and Bumi could be a of the first visible signs of this transformation.