Qiyuan Launches Consumer Humanoid Robots at 19,999 Yuan, Undercutting iPhone Prices

On September 20, Shangwei New Materials' subsidiary Qiyuan Robot officially launched the Q1 and T1 consumer humanoid robots, with prices starting at 19,999 yuan—the lowest for products of similar specifications. This is slightly less than a 1TB foldable iPhone.

Qiyuan introduced four products: humanoid robots Q1 and Q1 Explorer, plus transformable robots T1 and T1 Pro. Q1 and T1 are priced at 19,999 yuan, the Q1 Explorer at 26,999 yuan, and the T1 Pro at 29,999 yuan.

The Q1 Explorer opens software and hardware development kits and expansion interfaces, supporting full-stack secondary development and skill application development. The T1 Pro features Nvidia's robotics-specific compute chip, dual-form 360-degree omnidirectional obstacle avoidance, and new functions such as auto-recharge on low battery, voice summon, and follow-and-carry.

Qiyuan's ability to cut prices hinges on its production capacity. Tian Hua stated that even if tens of thousands of units are sold, the company can produce them. Qiyuan has introduced automotive manufacturing rhythms and quality management systems, achieving one robot off the line every 2.5 minutes, with long-term traceability of assembly data for each unit.

Tian summarized mass production capability into four aspects: whether the product can be designed, whether raw materials can be stably procured, whether capacity can keep up, and whether quality can remain consistent. Many of the thousands of robotics companies in China could make a single robot, but very few can produce 10,000 highly consistent ones.

This mass production system is backed by Shanghai's robot industry chain. Shanghai is China's most concentrated robotics hub, accounting for about one-third of the national industry scale. As of June this year, Zhangjiang alone had nearly 150 embodied AI-related companies, with Robot Valley gathering nearly 100 supply chain firms. The robot specialty industry output value reached about 13 billion yuan, up 14% year-on-year, and Zhangjiang's embodied AI supply chain coverage exceeds 70%.