❯ Unitree Technology’s strategic placement list includes DeepSeek; Wang Xingxing says it will receive model architecture and intelligent-computing cluster support

LISTThe IPO strategic placement list disclosed by Unitree Technology on August 6 includes DeepSeek, the company behind the DeepSeek AI models, which was allocated 933,400 shares — about RMB 141 million — representing 2.31% of the offering, with a 36-month lock-up period. The same batch also includes Tencent-affiliated Shanghai Qishan Investment, PetroChina’s Kunlun Capital, and capital arms of China Southern Power Grid and China Telecom.

RESPONSEAt the online roadshow on August 7, Chairman Wang Xingxing addressed the investment publicly for the first time: per the strategic cooperation memorandum signed by both parties, DeepSeek will provide technical support as needed in model architecture design, intelligent-computing cluster construction, and data center operations, with cooperation spanning joint R&D on general artificial intelligence, high-performance general-purpose robots, and AI large models. At the same roadshow, he personally put up RMB 15 million to participate in the strategic placement, while 171 executives and core employees collectively subscribed RMB 271.5 million.

BRAIN BOOSTThis marks the first time Liang Wenfeng and Wang Xingxing have been bound together at the equity level. Unitree’s most questioned shortcoming has always been its “brain” — no matter how well the hardware body and motion control are built, the model capabilities for embodied intelligence have to come from another source. The 36-month lock-up also shows this is not a financial investment. Other robot hardware makers will probably all ask the same question: is the model partner bought in, or bound in? This equity binding will directly affect the intensity of Unitree’s in-house R&D on embodied large models going forward, and will determine whether peers keep training their own models or simply find a model company to bring in as a shareholder.

▪ SIGNALThe easiest way for a hardware company to get a brain is to make the brain-maker a shareholder.