Linkerbot, the Beijing-based maker of dexterous robotic hands powering many of China's humanoid robots, has hired China Merchants Bank International, CITIC Securities and HSBC to work on a Hong Kong initial public offering that could come as soon as later this year and value the company near US$6 billion, Bloomberg reported.
The Robotic Hand Unicorn
Founded in 2023, Linkerbot has commercialised the Linker Hand series and says it controls more than 80% of the global high-degree-of-freedom dexterous robotic hand market. Its hands can thread a needle, snap a card or lift heavy industrial loads, and are increasingly used by humanoid builders that want to skip building their own end-effectors.
$3B to $6B in One Year
The IPO timing follows a flurry of late-stage rounds. A just-closed Series B+ financing put Linkerbot at roughly US$3 billion, and the company is now seeking a US$6 billion valuation in its next private round, according to people familiar with the talks. Backers include SDIC, Source Code Capital and Lightspeed China Partners.
China's Humanoid IPO Wave
Linkerbot joins a fast-forming queue of Chinese embodied-AI listings. Unitree has filed for a roughly US$7 billion IPO, EngineAI filed confidentially in June, and BYD-backed PaXini is weighing its own Hong Kong float. Together, Chinese robot makers have raised tens of billions of dollars this year as Beijing pushes hardware-led AI.
For more context on the wave, see our coverage of EngineAI's confidential Hong Kong filing, the PaXini IPO weighing and Unitree's IPO progress.
Reporting based on coverage from Bloomberg, The Standard, AI Insider and Yahoo Finance.