According to the Wind Chasing Trading Desk, JPMorgan Chase released a research report on October 25.Unitree upgraded its rating by two notches from "underweight" to "overweight".The target price for December 2027 was raised from 300 yuan to 995 yuan. On October 23, Unitree closed at 624 yuan, about 59% higher than its target price.
JPMorgan Chase's shift stems from its reassessment of the timeline for the implementation of physical AI. The bank stated that after conducting research at the China International Industry Fair, it remained cautious about the commercialization progress of Chinese robot manufacturers: hardware leadership has not yet been stably translated into repeatable business demand, and orders still mainly come from R&D, developer platforms, and small-batch pilot programs.
However, after the 2026 World Physics AI Conference and Partner Ecosystem Conference held in Hangzhou, the bank adjusted its judgment. According to Wang Xingxing, cited in the research report,Physical AI "has shown signs of breakthrough," and the breakthrough window may fall "in the next 1-2 years or 2-3 years." This is significantly earlier than his previous assessment that "it may take up to 10 years". Therefore, it is believed that the industry's sales S-curve may shift forward.
Analysts believe thatShorter timelines increase the strategic value of deployed bots, developer ecosystems, and real-world data.The report states that as large models advance in task planning, memory, context management, and cross-tool execution, industry bottlenecks are shifting from high-level reasoning capabilities to "real-world execution, data generation, and deployment iterations."
Analysts believe that as models become better at planning and supervision, the problem facing robotics companies will become: how to transform digital intelligence into "reliable, scalable, and safe" physical execution. Therefore, sensors, actuators, batteries, thermal management, calibration, safety, durability, and field service capabilities remain important components of the deployment process.
The upward revision of sales figures is concentrated after 2028, with a jump from 40,000 to 110,000.
Regarding its forecast figures, JPMorgan Chase has not raised its assumption for Unitree's 2026 humanoid robot sales to 14,163 units.However, the forecast for 2027 has been raised from 26,226 units to 31,701 units, and the forecast for 2028 has been significantly raised from 41,552 units to 11,554 units.Correspondingly, the bank's forecast for Universe's global humanoid robot market share shows that it will be raised from 8% to 21% in 2028 and from 4% to 12% in 2030. The bank stated that the new forecast assumptions reflect its advance judgment of the sales S-curve.
The bank projects that Unitree's revenue will be RMB 2.819 billion, RMB 4.888 billion, and RMB 13.383 billion in 2026, 2028, and 2028, respectively, with a year-on-year revenue growth rate of 173.8% in 2028. Adjusted net profit is expected to be RMB 616 million, RMB 1.125 billion and RMB 3.202 billion, respectively. The above data are all forecasts by the bank and do not reflect the company's disclosed performance.
The valuation logic also includes "scarcity".
In addition to technical and sales assumptions, JPMorgan Chase also incorporates capital market supply into its valuation framework. The bank stated that the increased focus on commercialization quality, sustainable order revenue, and business model durability during the review of IPOs and spin-offs of robotics companies may slow down the process of new listings for embodied intelligence companies than previously expected.The report argues that if investors seek public market targets embodying AI themes, the scarcity of listed companies may continue. The bank stated thatUnitree is "one of the few direct embodied AI investment mappings" in the A-share market. Its listed status, hardware platform and installed capacity constitute the basis for what the bank calls a "scarcity premium".
In terms of valuation methodology, JPMorgan Chase uses a projected price-to-sales ratio of 30 times in 2028 to provide a basis for its target price of 995 yuan. The bank stated that the valuation referenced high-quality comparable companies worldwide and recent private equity financing cases, including Agility Robotics.
However, JPMorgan Chase also clearly listed risks in its report: slower-than-expected adoption by enterprises and the inability to convert pilot projects into repeat orders may affect platform expansion; The accelerated commercialization of new entrants may bring competitive and profit margin pressures; Further tightening of regulations or geopolitical changes may also limit overseas expansion and the size of the markets it can serve.
The report states that Universe will need to demonstrate "repeat orders, agile operational reliability, security performance, and ecosystem monetization capabilities." This means that the advancement of the physical AI breakthrough time window is the core prerequisite for JPMorgan Chase to upgrade its rating, while the quality of corporate procurement and profitability are the verification indicators that it needs to track in the future.
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