Sharpa Raises Over $630M, Founder Denies Creating Robot Jobs

Sharpa, a Chinese general-purpose robot company, has disclosed cumulative funding exceeding 4.5 billion yuan (about $630 million), marking its first public funding announcement. Investors include Alibaba, Meituan, Tencent, JD.com, as well as Sequoia Capital China, Qiming Venture Partners, and Meituan Longzhu. The post-investment valuation stands at 22 billion yuan.

Founder Li Yifan emphasized that the company's mission is not to "create jobs for robots" but to free humans from mundane tasks, enabling them to pursue more creative work. He noted that Sharpa's robots are designed to augment human capabilities, not replace them.