China's robot makers have mastered the moves. Now comes the race for brains.

China's robot makers have mastered the moves. Now comes the race for brains. A Spirit AI's Moz1 humanoid robot serves candied hawthorn on sticks, simulating a cafe as a demonstration, at the 2026 Zhongguancun forum, in Beijing on March 25. Beijing - After years of building humanoid robots capable of running, dancing and performing backflips, Chinese companies are pouring resources into a different challenge: developing the artificial intelligence that could make those machines useful across a wider range of jobs. The shift is fueling an investment boom in embodied AI, a field focused on software that allows robots to understand their surroundings, learn unfamiliar tasks and adapt without having to be programmed for every job.