HONOR opened MWC Shanghai 2026 in unusual fashion: two humanoid robots walked on stage before a single human speaker took the floor, as the smartphone maker used the GSMA's flagship Asian event to stake a claim in embodied AI.
From AI phones to humanoid robots
During the 24 June opening ceremony, HONOR introduced two robots, Flash and a newer model called Vita Boy. Flash is no stranger to the spotlight: in April 2026 it won the Beijing Yizhuang Humanoid Robot Half-Marathon, completing the 21-kilometre course in 50 minutes and 26 seconds under fully autonomous navigation, a time faster than the human world record for the distance. Vita Boy, unveiled at the ceremony, builds on the same platform with refined dexterity and interaction tuned for live demonstrations.
For HONOR, spun out of Huawei in 2020, the robots are a statement that its on-device AI stack, perception, motion control and large-model reasoning, can extend beyond handsets into machines that move through the physical world.
A telecom industry pivot to machines
The staging was deliberate. GSMA leaders used the opening to argue that 5G-Advanced networks are becoming the nervous system of embodied AI, and that the mobile industry's mission is shifting from connecting people to enabling intelligent machines, from humanoid robots to drone fleets and autonomous vehicles. The message dovetails with China's broader humanoid drive, where firms such as UBTECH are ramping mass production and AgiBot is shipping embodied foundation models.
Crowded stage, rising stakes
HONOR joins a fast-expanding field of Chinese humanoid developers, including Lumos Robotics and others showcasing increasingly capable machines. Whether HONOR commercialises Flash and Vita Boy or uses them mainly to demonstrate its AI capabilities, the debut underscores how consumer-electronics giants are now treating humanoids as the next platform after the smartphone.
Reporting based on coverage from Tech Times and the GSMA.