Guo Yandong

Who he is

Guo Yandong is a rare founder with elite research-lab credentials plus hands-on experience in EVs and smart devices. He worked as a researcher at Microsoft's Seattle headquarters, then served as a chief scientist and R&D executive at XPeng and OPPO before founding AI² Robotics (智平方).

His company is betting that humanoid and mobile-manipulation success is a software problem. AI² Robotics builds end-to-end VLA (vision-language-action) models, deployed through its wheeled dual-arm "AlphaBot" robot in automotive, semiconductor and biopharma plants — with a reported 50,000+ hours without core failure.

Why he matters

Guo represents the model-first school of embodied AI: robots are the hardware, but the value is in the brain. His rule — factories first, living rooms later, and never sell robots to homes for profit in the near term — is a deliberate counterweight to the hype. He took questions three times at Davos' humanoid panel in 2026.