London Startup Humanoid Valued at $1.35 Billion After Series A Round

Two years after it was founded, London-based startup Humanoid announced a $152 million Series A round at a post-money valuation of $1.35 billion. It's the largest Series A round to date for a company building exclusively humanoid robots in Europe, and the first unicorn of its kind on the continent.

The round was led by Prime Movers Lab, with participation from German industrial giants Schaeffler and Bosch, Taiwan's Fubon Financial Holding Venture Capital, and Aglae Ventures, the investment vehicle of the Arnault family, owners of LVMH. The presence of two automotive and industrial conglomerates alongside venture capital funds shows that investors see humanoid robotics not as a technological experiment, but as an industrial product ready for deployment.

Who Is Humanoid

The company was founded in 2024 by Artem Sokolov, and within two years its team grew to include more than 50 engineers who previously worked at Boston Dynamics, Sanctuary AI, Apptronik and 1X, some of the world's leading humanoid robotics companies. Its flagship product, the HMND 01 robot, moves on wheels rather than two legs, which makes it easier to keep stable and quick to deploy on factory floors, though the company is also working on a bipedal version in parallel.

The robot is designed to reach about 80 percent of human speed when performing manual tasks. Its ability to understand commands and carry out complex physical actions relies on a proprietary AI system called KinetIQ. The company has already run nine pilot projects in logistics, manufacturing and retail.

In just two years we've gone from an idea to being Europe's first pure-play humanoid robotics unicorn, with partnerships with some of the world's leading industrial companies and one of the strongest order books in the industry - Artem Sokolov, CEO of Humanoid

The Schaeffler and Bosch Deal

The centerpiece of the announcement is the agreement with Schaeffler, the German industrial components manufacturer, which has ordered 1,000 robots with an option to expand the order to 100,000 units over five years. Production of the physical units will fall to Bosch, which entered a manufacturing partnership with Humanoid through its subsidiary Robert Bosch Robotics and has committed manufacturing capacity sufficient for 100,000 robots.

By combining our decades of industrial experience and manufacturing excellence with Humanoid's breakthrough physical AI platform, we are actively supporting one of the most exciting frontiers in technology - Klaus Rosenfeld, CEO of Schaeffler

SAP, Nvidia and Siemens have also joined the list of strategic partners, suggesting that Humanoid is building a full integration chain, from enterprise-grade software through computing power to industrial hardware. The company says it already has 34,000 pre-launch orders worth a combined $2.4 billion, though such a large number of reservations for a product still entering its beta phase will need to be confirmed by actual deliveries in the coming quarters.

The Race for European Robotics

Today the humanoid robot market is playing out mainly between the US and China. America's Figure reached a $39 billion valuation in 2026, while Chinese companies such as Psibot and Zhiyuan Robot are raising hundreds of millions of dollars backed by automakers, including Chery. Europe has so far lagged behind, focusing more on components and research than on finished commercial products.

Backed by capital from German industry, Humanoid is trying to reverse that trend and build a European player capable of competing with American and Chinese rivals on their own turf, mass-producing robots for factories and warehouses.

Humanoid robotics will be one of the defining technologies of the next decade, transforming how commercial and industrial work gets done - Zia Huque, general partner at Prime Movers Lab

What It Means for Polish Companies

For now, the orders from Schaeffler and production at Bosch concern the two companies' Western European plants, but both also operate large factories and logistics centers in Poland. If the 2026 pilots succeed, humanoid robot deployments on factory floors could reach Polish plants faster than with American or Chinese competitors, who are focused mainly on their home markets.

For Poland's industrial automation sector and robotics integrators, this also means a new, well-capitalized supplier to watch, especially since Humanoid says it plans to launch its first commercial deployments this year.