China National Petroleum Corporation's (CNPC) manufacturing and capital arms plan to form a joint venture with Unitree Robotics Technology Co., Ltd. (Unitree Robotics) and Beijing Fanjie Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd. (Fanjie Intelligent) to build industrial embodied-intelligence robot solutions, with the CNPC side holding a controlling 60% stake1.
Beijing Municipal Administration for Market Regulation published a notice on Nov. 4 disclosing the proposed JV. China National Petroleum Corporation Kunlun Manufacturing Co., Ltd. (Kunlun Manufacturing) and its concert party China National Petroleum Corporation Kunlun Capital Co., Ltd. (Kunlun Capital) will together hold 60%, while Unitree Robotics and Fanjie Intelligent will each hold 20%.
Scope of the partnership
The JV will focus on deploying embodied-AI robots in industrial settings. A separate Strategic Cooperation Memorandum signed between Unitree Robotics, CNPC, and Kunlun Capital covers inspection and emergency-rescue applications across oil-and-gas, refining, and storage-and-transportation scenarios, as well as deployments at gas stations and integrated energy stations for battery charging and swapping, and coordinated overseas-market development. The memorandum also provides for Kunlun Bank and Kunlun Financial Leasing to offer Unitree Robotics financial products and explore robot-leasing businesses. Unitree Robotics provides quadruped robot products with conventional and explosion-proof qualifications.
The deal is the second capital-level tie-up between the CNPC system and Unitree Robotics in roughly three months. In August, Kunlun Capital was allotted 903,300 shares in Unitree Robotics' STAR Market strategic placement for approximately CNY 136 million (about $20.4 million). The two arrangements are independent: shares Kunlun Capital obtained in the strategic placement will not convert into equity in the JV.
Regulatory and commercial hurdles
The JV still requires antitrust review and business registration before it can begin operations. Explosion-proof product certification, model integration, and order conversion also remain to be verified.
Unitree Robotics set up an internal Industrial Department this year to explore deploying humanoid robots in industrial scenarios.
ANALYSIS A state-owned energy giant taking a majority position in a robotics venture with a listed AI-robotics company marks a concrete channel for embodied-AI deployment inside China's upstream energy infrastructure, an environment where explosion-proof certification and harsh-condition autonomy are baseline requirements.
The JV follows a period of rapid growth and heavy investment for Unitree Robotics. The company reported third-quarter revenue of CNY 665 million ($99.7 million), a roughly 70% year-over-year increase, though net profit fell 17.4% as R&D spending tripled[1]. Its STAR Market debut in August coincided with a broader rotation of Chinese capital from semiconductor stocks into robotics plays[2].