Chinese general-purpose robotics firm Fourier has raised a new investment to bring the overall funding in its Series E round to almost 800 million yuan ($109.1 million) with support from investors including Prosperity7 Ventures.
Shanghai-headquartered Fourier disclosed the scale of its Series E round, its biggest so far, in a WeChat post on Tuesday, after raising capital across a few tranches throughout 2024 and at the start of 2025.
According to the post, Saudi oil giant Aramco’s Prosperity7 invested in the Series E round along with Chinese asset management firm Peakvest and multiple investment companies from Shanghai, including the state-backed Guoxin Investment and Zhangjiang Science & Technology Venture Capital.
“The successful completion of the new round further propels us to be more committed to our goal of ‘building the most intuitive embodied agent for AI (artificial intelligence).’ It marks an important step in our efforts to move towards empowering human life through robotic technologies,” Fourier founder and CEO Alex Gu wrote in the post.
The firm did not disclose its post-money valuation. In January 2022, Fourier closed a Series D round at 400 million yuan ($54.6 million) led by SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2. Prosperity 7, and China-based Vision Plus Capital participated.
Funded in 2015, Fourier closed its biggest funding round to date following its rebranding from “Fourier Intelligence” in the summer of 2024 to reflect an expansion of its business scope into the development of general-purpose humanoid robots.
As part of the rebranding, the firm renamed its existing business line of exoskeleton and rehabilitation product R&D as “Fourier Rehab,” which focuses exclusively on rehabilitation and related scientific research.
Its expansion into humanoid robotics pits Fourier against the likes of Boston Dynamics; Agility Robotics; Figure; and Elon Musk’s Tesla, which plans to begin limited production of its Optimus robots in 2025 for internal use before making them available to other firms by 2026.
In China, Baidu Ventures and Hillhouse-backed AgiBot, publicly-listed Ubtech Robotics, as well as Xiaomi Corp (CyberOne) and electric vehicle maker Xpeng (PX5) are among some of the major players racing to capture opportunities in this AI-powered booming market that is estimated to reach $38 billion by 2023, according to Goldman Sachs.
Fourier launched its first mass-produced humanoid robot GR-1 in 2023. In September 2024, Fourier introduced GR-2, the latest addition to its “GRx” humanoid robot series.
Standing at 175cm and weighing 63kg, GR-2 offers 53 degrees of freedom and a single-arm load capacity of 3kg. Compared to GR-1, the latest model features a detachable battery with doubled capacity, extending the runtime to two hours, as well as an enhanced ability to learn and transition from AI simulation to real-world applications.
Fourier already delivered over 100 GR-1 humanoid robots to clients for AI research, advanced manufacturing, hotel and restaurant reception, and safety improvement in dealing with toxic substances, Gu revealed during the 2024 World Robot Conference last August in Beijing.
With a team of over 500 employees globally, Fourier offers robotic services to over 2,000 organisations and hospitals across more than 40 countries and regions globally, according to its website.
