The first pure play humanoid robotics company, Agility Robotics (AGLT), began trading on Thursday morning on the Nasdaq. Agility's flagship product is a humanoid robot known as Digit that is similar to Tesla's (TSLA) Optimus.
Agility Robotics completed its merger with Churchill Capital Corp XI as of Wednesday. Agility launched the merger with Churchill, a special purpose acquisition company, in June. It begins trading under the Agility name and AGLT ticker as of Thursday.
On Thursday, shares of the recently renamed AGLT closed up about 1% on Thursday, despite having tumbled nearly 25% over the course of the day, according to MarketSurge. Trading under the Churchill name, the SPAC stock had gained 40% over the past three weeks, off a late October low.
Agility Robotics Begins Trading
Agility expects to raise $465 million from going public, according to the company. The company originally expected to raise $620 million but a group of investors opted to cash out rather than roll over their equity into the new combined company. That lowered the overall capital raise, according to SEC filings.
About $200 million of the money raised will come from a private sale of stock at $10 a share led by investor Foxconn, which is one of the world's largest electronics manufacturers, according to a press release.
Since its inception, Agility has attracted a host of other notable backers, such as Nvidia (NVDA), Amazon (AMZN) and SoftBank (SFTBY).
At present, its Digit robots are designed mostly for use in manufacturing and logistics. Digit is already in use at several major companies, including Toyota (TMC) factories in Canada, German auto parts supplier Schaeffler and the logistics company GXO (GXO).
Tesla And Chinese Rivals
The proliferation of AI has made robots like Agility's Digit increasingly possible. Current AI systems are sophisticated enough to effectively train the robots, which, in turn, makes the models on which they operate powerful enough to actually execute complex tasks in the real world.
As a result, Agility Robotics is not alone in developing such products.
Elon Musk's Tesla is among the most high-profile tech companies working on a line of robots. In fact, much of Tesla's future is riding on the success of its still-unreleased Optimus robots. Last month, during an earnings call, Musk reiterated his view that Optimus will be the "biggest product ever."
Tesla was supposed to start production of Optimus robots this summer but has since repeatedly pushed back that timeline, citing manufacturing challenges.
The robotics industry is also booming in China. In August, Unitree became the first pure-play robotics company to go public in mainland China in a blockbuster IPO that saw it gain 460% in its first day. Shares are up about 350% since then.
Meanwhile, Chinese EV firms such as XPeng (XPEV) and BYD (BYDDF) are taking a similar approach to Tesla and using their expertise in self-driving cars to develop robots.
https://www.investors.com/news/tesla-agility-robotics-nvidia-amazon-foxconn-optimus-spac-merger/
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