The embodied AI market remains hot! Another dexterous hand company has completed a financing round of hundreds of millions of yuan.
This time, the bet is on LinkerBot.
It is the only company globally to achieve mass production of thousands of high-degree-of-freedom (DoF) dexterous hands, with shipments accounting for a staggering 80% share of the entire industry market.
Just four months have passed since its last financing round exceeding 100 million yuan, which was also the largest seed-round investment in the history of the dexterous hand sector to date.
This latest round is led by Ant Group, with co-investments from CICC Capital, Shoufa Development Venture Capital, Shanghai Semiconductor Equipment Fund, Chengkai Fund, Detong Capital, and Keke Pufeng. Old shareholder Sequoia China Seed Fund increased its stake, bringing the total amount to hundreds of millions of yuan.
While market tailwinds benefit embodied AI enterprises, dexterous hands—as the end-effectors of humanoid robots—are also entering a critical year for practical application and validation.
But why LinkerBot?
Two Financing Rounds Exceeding 100 Million Yuan
Since its founding in 2019, LinkerBot has primarily secured two rounds of financing, both exceeding 100 million yuan.
The first occurred in April this year, when LinkerBot received a seed-round investment led by Sequoia Seed Fund and Wankai Advanced Materials, totaling over 100 million yuan. This set a new record for seed-round financing in the dexterous hand sector.
The funds from this round were primarily used for underlying technology research, product optimization, and iteration, aiming to strengthen the technical barriers of its “Dexterous Hand + Cloud Brain” embodied AI platform and consolidate its leading position in the global high-DoF dexterous hand market.
In the recently announced angel-round financing of hundreds of millions of yuan, Sequoia Seed Fund continued to increase its investment alongside new investors joining the fold. The most notable newcomer is Ant Group.
Ant Group has been active in investing in the embodied AI sector recently, actively backing several emerging embodied AI companies such as Unitree Robotics, Taihu Robot, and Stardust Intelligence. It also established a wholly-owned self-developed company focused on expanding its embodied AI and robotics business.
Prior to this financing round, LinkerBot completed changes in its business registration in June, adding Shanghai Yunchang Enterprise Management Consulting Co., Ltd. and CICC Guanbo (Shanghai) Private Equity Investment Fund Partnership (Limited Partnership) as new shareholders. Notably, Shanghai Yunchang is a subsidiary wholly owned by Ant Group.
At the same time, LinkerBot’s registered capital increased from 6.615 million yuan to 7.208 million yuan.
This angel-round financing of hundreds of millions of yuan is expected to be used for enhancing technical reserves and building embodied AI data collection sites, accelerating the application of dexterous hands in scenarios such as industrial manufacturing and healthcare.
Why Are Investors Betting on LinkerBot?
Although LinkerBot was founded relatively recently, it has accumulated substantial technological expertise.
Its self-developed Linker Hand series offers an industrial version with 25-30 degrees of freedom (DoF) and a research version with up to 42 DoF. This far exceeds the capabilities of major foreign manufacturers like Tesla’s Optimus (22 DoF) and the UK’s Shadow Hand (24 DoF), making it the commercial dexterous hand with the highest degrees of freedom globally.
Each finger can independently achieve up to 9 DoF, allowing for 360-degree rotation, with a maximum load capacity of 5 kg.
In terms of hardware structure, it covers both linkage structures and cable-driven structures, making LinkerBot the only company in China to achieve commercial mass production of dexterous hands using both designs simultaneously.
Additionally, the series is equipped with a multi-sensor system that simulates human fingertip touch sensitivity for precise environmental interaction.
LinkerBot has also established DexSkill-Net, the world’s largest dataset for dexterous manipulation. Covering massive amounts of real-world operation scenario data, it assists in training the cloud brain to continuously optimize decision-making models and improve processing capabilities for various tasks.
Alongside its strong performance, the series maintains a significant cost advantage. Official tests show it is 10 times more durable than the Shadow Hand, yet costs only one-thirtieth of its price (50,000 yuan vs. 1.5 million yuan).
The Linker Hand O7 model has further reduced the price to 8,800 yuan, significantly lowering the barrier to entry for dexterous hand development and application.
Currently, monthly sales have exceeded one thousand units. While major overseas manufacturers struggle with issues such as load capacity and battery life that prevent them from mass-producing high-DoF dexterous hands, LinkerBot is the only company globally to achieve mass production of thousands of units and the only one capable of mass-producing all types of drive mechanisms. It holds an 80% market share, ranking first in the industry.
The products are widely used in scientific research by top domestic and international universities such as Cambridge University, Stanford University, Peking University, and Tsinghua University, and have also been deployed in industrial and medical scenarios.
Recently, LinkerBot launched the Linker Hand L6 and L20 industrial versions specifically for semi-open industrial scenarios, meeting demands for high load capacity and flexibility.
Both models are equipped with a newly developed “Super Electric Cylinder” drive module, which integrates driving and control within a palm-sized space. With a drive efficiency of up to 90%, it is more than twice as efficient as traditional levels.
Behind this emerging enterprise, which shows great potential and market leadership, lies an R&D team with rich technical backgrounds.
Founder and CEO Zhou Yong graduated from the Youth Class at Huazhong University of Science and Technology. He has over ten years of experience in internet consumer products and robotics. Several core team members have previously served as technical leads at companies such as CloudMinds, Segway-Ninebot, and AUBO Robotics.
Other members also hail from prestigious domestic and international universities like Tsinghua University and Peking University. The total R&D team has reached several hundred people, possessing ample experience in product commercialization.
In the future, LinkerBot will continue to focus on the synergistic development of hardware and software, striving to complete flexible manufacturing decision-execution terminals and further leading embodied AI into full-scenario applications.
References
- LinkerBot Completes Hundreds of Millions of Yuan Angel Financing, Only Company Globally to Mass-Production Thousands of High-DoF Dexterous Hands — The only company globally achieving mass production of thousands of high-DoF dexterous hands.
- [vfC47Y6YcpfP66x](https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/vfC47Y6YcpfP66x\) — mp.weixin.qq.com/s/vfC47Y6YcpfP66x/
- Dexterous Hand - LinkerBot Robot Dexterous Hands | The World’s Highest DoF and Safest Dexterous Hands — LinkerBot focuses on developing high-performance robot dexterous hands, offering multiple products such as L10, L20, and L30. Provider of the world’s highest DoF and safest dexterous hand solutions.
- 7520607326811488810 — www.toutiao.com/article/7520607326811488810