Humanoid Robots Keep Slipping Into the Future, Much Like Fusion - CleanTechnica
A commercially available humanoid robot that can safely operate around humans, perform diverse tasks without supervision, and meet certification and liability requirements is likely decades away.
Key takeaways
LG is set to unveil its newest service robot, the CLOiD humanoid, at CES 2026 in Las Vegas, presenting a fully humanoid form with dual seven‑degree‑of‑freedom arms and five‑fingered hands. The company will showcase the robot at Booth 15004 in the Las Vegas Convention Center, highlighting its integration of AI safety research through recent investments in firms such as Figure AI, Agibot and Dyna Robotics. In parallel, the Chinese market continues to accelerate, with Unitree’s latest humanoid model, the H2, demonstrated this year and drawing attention for its dancing capabilities, while analysts note that China is currently outpacing the United States in early commercialisation of humanoid robots. Industry observers also point out that despite a surge of venture funding—$4.6 billion invested in 2025—the commercial availability of fully autonomous, safely operable humanoids remains a few years away, and the sector is experiencing a wave of reality‑check scrutiny at events like CES and the Humanoids Summit.
A commercially available humanoid robot that can safely operate around humans, perform diverse tasks without supervision, and meet certification and liability requirements is likely decades away. Assigning a large valuation premium to Optimus today assumes breakthroughs in manipulation, safety, autonomy, and integration that have not yet occurred and won’t arrive on investor-relevant timelines. It’s just another part of Tesla’s meme stock status, along with full self driving which gets halfway Humanoid robots have a habit of returning to public attention in waves. Each wave arrives with smoother motion, better balance, and more confident timelines. The claim is usually some version of general purpose capability. The promise is a machine that can safely share space with humans and perform a wide range of everyday tasks in homes and workplaces. This promise has been made repeatedly for decades. Each time, the technical progress is real, but the delivery date moves forward again. The much farther away than the demos suggest.
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