Robots are becoming smarter in "brains," more agile in "bodies," and more diverse in application scenarios... In 2026, multiple regions across China have intensively rolled out policy documents to accelerate the industrialization of the robotics sector. Meanwhile, leveraging their own industrial endowments, these regions are forging differentiated development paths.
Specialized Policies Advance Industrial Development from Multiple Dimensions
Since the beginning of this year, multiple regions including Xiamen, Tianjin, Guangzhou, and Heilongjiang have introduced specialized policy measures for intelligent robots, formulating overall planning goals for the next two to three years based on their local conditions.
In recent years, Xiamen has attracted numerous well-known robotics enterprises through its solid industrial foundation and robust policies. Related robotic products are widely applied in various scenarios, forming a closed loop from technology R&D to scenario validation and ultimately to application deployment. Based on the realities of industrial development, Xiamen proposed this year to strive to build a "highland for the development of the embodied AI industry with distinctive features, prominent advantages, and a well-improved ecosystem." On August 1, the "Three-Year Action Plan for the Development of Xiamen's Embodied AI Industry (2026-2028)" was officially implemented, valid until December 31, 2028. According to the plan, Xiamen has identified three key tasks: tackling key core technologies, building a high-level service system, and optimizing the entire industrial chain ecosystem. It also set overall development goals: by 2028, Xiamen will cultivate more than 10 new provincial-level SRDI (Specialized, Refined, Differential, and Innovative) enterprises, have over 100 related enterprises in the embodied AI robot industry cluster, and achieve an associated industry scale of over 30 billion yuan.
In August this year, the Tianjin Municipal Bureau of Industry and Information Technology, along with two other departments, jointly issued the "Tianjin Action Plan for the Innovative Development of the Intelligent Robot Industry (2026-2028)". It proposed that by the end of 2028, the core output value of the city's intelligent robot industry will exceed 20 billion yuan, with an average annual growth rate of over 15%. The supporting rate in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region will be raised to over 60%, forming a full-process industrial ecosystem of "R&D - manufacturing - application - service" and a full-chain ecosystem of "decision and control - main body - core components - integration service." By then, the city will build one intelligent robot innovation consortium, strive to establish one to two national-level innovation platforms, tackle core technologies in main control chips, operating systems, reducers, and servo motors for intelligent robots, and develop 20 technological products. It will also cultivate more than three enterprises with an output value exceeding 1 billion yuan and 20 national-level SRDI "little giant" enterprises. Furthermore, it will build the Tianjin Intelligent Robot Innovation Center and the Tianjin Intelligent Robot Agile Intelligent Manufacturing Center, creating a batch of demonstration and experience centers. Additionally, no less than 20 real-scenario practical training spaces will be built, forming over 100 demonstration application scenarios in fields such as industrial manufacturing, special operations, and livelihood services.
In July this year, Guangzhou also formulated a specialized policy for embodied AI robots—the "Several Measures of Guangzhou to Promote the High-Quality Development of the Embodied AI Robot Industry". The document rolled out a series of initiatives around eight aspects: innovative R&D, training and testing, enterprise growth, scenario cultivation, competitions and events, financial empowerment, pilot demonstrations, and market expansion. It strives that by 2029, Guangzhou will implement more than 15 major scientific and technological research projects in the field of embodied AI and robotics, have more than 40 application demonstration scenarios selected at or above the provincial level, gather around 10 complete machine manufacturing enterprises, and help about two enterprises enter the domestic "first tier."
In April this year, Heilongjiang issued the "Several Policy Measures of Heilongjiang Province to Support the Development of the Intelligent Robot Industry", proposing that by the end of 2028, the province will strive to break through the 10 billion yuan mark in the scale of the intelligent robot industry, cultivate and form three to five domestically leading chain leader enterprises, and create an industrial spatial layout centered on Harbin's "Intelligent Robot Island" with multi-point support. It will also promote the scaled application of intelligent robots in characteristic scenarios such as modern agriculture, intelligent manufacturing, and the ice and snow economy, building an innovative ecosystem with efficient collaboration among industry, academia, research, and application.
"In developing the robotics industry, Heilongjiang must never follow the herd, let alone engage in 'dragon-slaying skills' that have no practical application value. The core is to align with local needs, leverage local advantages, and solve practical problems." Liu Hong, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, director of the State Key Laboratory of Robotics and Systems, and vice president of Harbin Institute of Technology, articulated the basic logic that the development of the robotics industry must adapt to local conditions.
Based on its own characteristics, Heilongjiang has proposed 17 measures in four major aspects: enhancing industrial innovation capacity, promoting industrial cluster development, strengthening scenario innovation and application, and reinforcing the support of development elements. Heilongjiang explicitly supports enterprises in fields such as medical robots, industrial robots, agricultural robots, and robot operating systems in financing and going public. It will fully explore the resources of pipeline enterprises for listing, form a pipeline of enterprises ready for listing, and connect with multi-tiered capital markets by category. A "green channel" for enterprise listing will be opened, and a rapid processing mechanism for enterprise listing service matters will be established. For various service matters involving provincial-level pipeline enterprises for listing, rapid and effective processing will be implemented based on the principles of dedicated personnel, tracking services, and time-limited completion. In addition, Heilongjiang also proposed guiding government financing guarantee institutions to increase support for intelligent robot enterprises, making good use of the Longjiang Angel Investment Fund and the Advanced Manufacturing Fund to support investments in the intelligent robot field, and promoting the accelerated development of start-up and growth-stage sci-tech innovation enterprises in this field. Furthermore, it encourages financial institutions to innovate exclusive financial products for the intelligent robot industry, continuously promote more diversified and high-quality financing services, and help solve financing difficulties.
Cultivating Characteristic Advantages in Segmented Tracks
In addition to introducing specialized measures, since the beginning of this year, multiple regions across China have also released policies related to the robotics and embodied AI industries in other relevant documents, based on regional characteristics and in more segmented tracks.
In July this year, the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization issued the "Several Measures of Shanghai to Further Promote the Development of 'AI (Artificial Intelligence) + Manufacturing'", proposing substantial financial support for promoting manufacturing development with robotics technology: it proposed promoting embodied AI robots to create real-scenario application scenarios in manufacturing, with a maximum support of 10 million yuan. In addition, it proposed that equipment such as robots applying AI to improve perception, collaboration, and autonomous decision-making levels to achieve first-of-its-kind breakthroughs will receive a maximum support of 20 million yuan. For terminal products such as companion robots with AI capabilities, the maximum support is also 20 million yuan.
The development of the robotics industry is inseparable from data training. Guizhou has targeted this opportunity to focus on developing the robot data collection industry. In July this year, Guizhou held a press conference on the high-quality development of the data industry. At the conference, the newly released 2026 edition of the "Guizhou Province Big Data Development Special Fund Support Guide" included embodied AI data collection as a core support direction for the first time. Embodied AI data collection is a new data production business format aimed at the training of robots and intelligent equipment. In real physical scenarios, Guizhou relies on motion capture equipment, multi-sensors, etc., to collect multi-modal interactive data such as human operation actions, visual images, and force and tactile feedback. After cleaning and labeling, it forms high-fidelity datasets dedicated to robot training, providing core data support for the scaled deployment of robots. A relevant person in charge of the Guizhou Provincial Big Data Development Bureau stated that currently, there are only 500,000 hours of compliant data for real physical interaction scenarios in China, while the commercial deployment of robots requires tens of millions of hours of data. The gap exceeds 99%, leaving huge market space. Therefore, it is necessary for Guizhou to layout and develop embodied AI data collection.
Nanjing has focused on the scaled application of robots in new scenarios and proposed multiple measures. At the beginning of this year, Nanjing issued the "Nanjing Action Plan for Promoting the Scaled Application of New Scenarios and High-Level Construction of a Scenario-Open City (2026-2028)". Specifically in terms of embodied AI, the plan proposed taking the robot industry cluster area in the Jiangning Development Zone as the core engine to build a city-wide highland for embodied AI innovation. Focusing on intelligent manufacturing and livelihood services, the plan proposed creating industrial-level application scenarios such as intelligent production line collaboration, unmanned warehousing and logistics, intelligent welding operations, predictive equipment maintenance, human-robot collaboration safety, and intelligent quality inspection. It also aims to build a livelihood service matrix covering smart healthcare, intelligent culture, sports, and tourism, unmanned catering, security patrol, smart education, and commercial services. The plan also proposed that Nanjing will implement 100 demonstration scenarios, form more than 50 typical cases that can be replicated and promoted, and drive the clustered development of more than 250 related enterprises in the robotics field.
Beijing, on the other hand, proposed this year to explore and enrich cutting-edge robot consumption paradigms. According to the "Implementation Plan for Further Accelerating the Construction of a City-Wide AI City (2026-2027)" issued by the Administrative Committee of Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area, Beijing will innovate the "front shop and back factory" model for robots, open robot-themed restaurants and hotels, and link up with "robot 4S stores" in the region to achieve a one-stop closed loop of display experience, sales delivery, and operation and maintenance services.
Author | Lu Yichen Editor | Qiu Jiangyong Art Editor | Malia Supervisor | Lian Xiaodong