QiYuan Robotics CEO: Company Aims to Lead Consumer Robotics as Home Robots Debut
After QiYuan Robotics, a subsidiary of Sweili New Material, launched its Q1 and T1 personal robots in Shanghai on September 20, 2026, Sweili CEO Tian Hua and QiYuan Research Institute chief scientist Dong Hao spoke to media about the company's move into home scenarios, the generalization challenge in embodied AI, positioning, and mass production.
The base versions of both robots are priced at 19,999 yuan, with the Q1 Explorer at 26,999 yuan and the T1 Pro at 29,999 yuan. Tian described QiYuan's goal as becoming a leading consumer robotics company, and said future revenue will come from hardware sales, content (subscriptions and IP), and services (operations and maintenance), with the latter two seen as the bigger long-term growth opportunities.
Dong outlined a horizontal scaling law to address the generalization problem in embodied AI: rather than completing ten tasks at 70 percent accuracy, focus on making three tasks 100 percent reliable first, then expand horizontally. Because home environments are highly unstructured, QiYuan's initial phase will emphasize education, companionship, entertainment, and developer applications rather than complex chores.
Tian said R&D spending exceeded 160 million yuan in the first half of 2026 and is expected to be more than 500 million yuan for the full year, covering robot hardware, motion control, multimodal interaction, and agents. The production line can complete one robot every 2.5 minutes, with traceable assembly data.
QiYuan said more than 1,000 developer partners are contributing skills, with over 100 new skills added monthly, and partnerships with universities and developer communities. The first batch of authorized experience stores covers seven cities including Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Xiamen, Wuhan and Xi'an. Internationally, the company plans to complete its overseas expansion in 2026, expects 2027 to be its first year of overseas sales, and targets about 30 percent of robot revenue from abroad.
