After my first article on humanoid robots received a lot of positive feedback, I went into more detail.

Extended analysis of the value chain including shovel manufacturers and potential hidden champions

New categorySecondary key sectors (sales, marketing, financing)

In additionTop 25 companies worldwide, as well as Top 10 Europe and Top 10 Asia

I have also added a video link for beginners. This will give you an idea of how far the development of humanoid robotics has already progressed.

https://www.stern.de/panorama/wissen/humanoider-roboter---wie-reagiert-er-auf-beleidigungen--35996156.html

Thank you for your attention and your support 🙏

🌐 1. value chain of humanoid robots (with hidden champions)

1. research & chip design

$ARM (+0,08 %) ARM (UK) - CPU-IP, energy-efficient processors

$SNPS (-0,93 %) Synopsys (US) - EDA software, chip design

$CDNS (-0,14 %) Cadence (US) - EDA & Simulation

$PTC PTC (US) - Engineering Software, CAD/PLM

$DSY (-1,53 %) Dassault Systèmes (FR) - 3D Design & Digital Twin

$SIE (-0,89 %) Siemens (DE) - Industrial Software & Lifecycle Mgmt

$ADBE (+0,73 %) Adobe (US) - Design, AR/UX

ANSYS (US) - multiphysical simulation - acquisition by Synopsis

Altair (US) - CAE, simulation, digital twin - acquisition by Siemens

$HXGBY (-1,56 %)
Hexagon (SE) - Metrology & Simulation

$AWE (-0,73 %) Alphawave IP Group (UK) - High-speed chip IP for AI/robotics

1.Synopsis, 2.Siemens and 3.Adobe are my favorites in this sector.

2. manufacturing technology & equipment

$ASML (+0,58 %) ASML (NL) - Lithography (EUV)

$AMAT (+0,16 %) Applied Materials (US) - Semiconductor equipment

$8035 (-0,06 %) Tokyo Electron (JP) - wafer fabrication

$KEYS (+0,8 %) Keysight Technologies (US) - Metrology

$6857 (-1,52 %) Advantest (JP) - Chip test systems

$TER (+2,2 %) Teradyne (US) - test systems + cobots

$6954 (+0,9 %) Fanuc (JP) - Industrial robots, CNC

$CAT (-0,13 %) Caterpillar (US) - autonomous machines

$KU2G KUKA (DE) - industrial robots

Comau (IT) - automation - not listed on the stock exchange

$ROK Rockwell Automation (US) - industrial automation

$JBL (+1,69 %) Jabil (US) - contract manufacturing (EMS/ODM)

$KIT (-0,66 %) Kitron (NO) - European EMS/ODM manufacturer

$AIXA (+1,26 %) Aixtron (DE) - deposition equipment for compound semiconductors

$LRCX (+1,53 %)
Lam Research (US) - Etch/deposition systems

$MKSI (+0,78 %)
MKS Instruments (US) - Plasma/vacuum technology

$ASM (+0,24 %)
ASM International (NL) - Deposition systems

3. chip production (foundries)

$TSM (+2,19 %) TSMC (TW) - leading foundry

$005930 Samsung Electronics (KR) - foundry + memory

$GFS (+0,42 %) GlobalFoundries (US) - specialty chips

$INTC (+0 %)
Intel Foundry Services (US) - new western foundry player

$981
SMIC (CN) - largest Chinese foundry

$UMC
UMC (TW) - Power/RF/embedded chips

4th computing & control unit ("brain")

$NVDA (+1,94 %) Nvidia (US) - GPUs, AI chips

$INTC (+0 %) Intel (US) - CPUs, FPGAs

$AMD (-2,24 %) AMD (US) - CPUs, GPUs

$MRVL (+0,18 %) Marvell (US) - network chips

$MU (-0,47 %) Micron (US) - Memory

$DELL (+1,23 %) Dell Technologies (US) - Edge & Infrastructure

Graphcore (UK) - AI chips (IPU) - not a listed company

Cerebras (US) - Wafer-scale engine - not a listed company

SiPearl (FR) - European HPC chip - not a listed company

5. sensor technology ("senses")

$6758 (-0,57 %) Sony (JP) - image sensors

$6861 (+2,17 %) Keyence (JP) - industrial sensors

$STM (+0 %) STMicroelectronics (FR/IT) - Sensors, MCUs

$TDY Teledyne (US) - optical/infrared sensors

$CGNX (-0,98 %) Cognex (US) - Machine Vision

$HON (-0,21 %) Honeywell (US) - sensor technology, security

ANYbotics (CH) - autonomous sensor fusion - not a listed company

$OUST
Velodyne Lidar (US) - Lidar sensors - takeover by Ouster

$AMS (+0,73 %)
-OSRAM (AT/DE) - Optical sensors

6. actuators & power electronics ("muscles")

$IFX (-0,52 %) Infineon (DE) - power electronics

$ON (-1,39 %) onsemi (US) - Power & Sensors

$TXN (+0,35 %) (US) - Mixed-signal chips

$ADI (+0,8 %) Analog Devices (US) - Signal Processing

$PH Parker-Hannifin (US) - Hydraulics/Pneumatics

$MP (+7,61 %) MP Materials (US) - Magnets

$APH (+0,9 %) Amphenol (US) - Connectors

$6481 (+3,06 %) THK (JP) - Linear guides & actuators

$6324 (+4,7 %)
Harmonic Drive (JP) - Precision gears & servo drives for robotics

$6594 (+5,42 %)
Nidec (JP) - Electric motors

$6506 (+0,92 %)
Yaskawa (JP) - Drives & Robotics

$SU (-1,13 %)
Schneider Electric (FR) - Energy & control solutions

$ZIL2 (+0,43 %)
ElringKlinger (DE) - Battery & fuel cell technology, lightweight construction

7. communication & networking ("nerves")

$QCOM (-0,35 %) Qualcomm (US) - Mobile communications, Edge AI

$ANET (+0,35 %) Arista Networks (US) - Networks

$CSCO (+0,33 %) Cisco (US) - Networks, Security

$EQIX (+2,03 %) Equinix (US) - Data centers

NTT Docomo (JP) - 5G/6G carrier - not a listed company

$VZ Verizon (US) - Telecommunications

$SFTBY SoftBank (JP) - Carrier + Robotics

$ERIC B (+0,94 %)
Ericsson (SE) - 5G/IoT infrastructure

$NOKIA (+0,39 %)
Nokia (FI) - 5G/6G for industry

$HPE (+0,63 %)
Juniper Networks (US) - Network technology - acquisition by HP

8. energy supply

$300750 CATL (CN) - Batteries

$6752 (-1,71 %) Panasonic (JP) - Batteries

$373220 LG Energy (KR) - Batteries

$ALB (+0,28 %) Albemarle (US) - Lithium

$LYC (+4,02 %) Lynas (AU) - Rare earths

$UMICY (+1,85 %) Umicore (BE) - recycling

WiTricity (US) - inductive charging - not a listed company

$ABBN (-0,4 %) Charging (CH) - charging infrastructure

$SLDP
Solid Power (US) - Solid state batteries

Northvolt (SE) - European batteries - not a listed company

$PLUG
Plug Power (US) - Fuel cells

9. cloud & infrastructure

$AMZN (+0,11 %) Amazon AWS (US) - Cloud, AI

$MSFT (+0,08 %) Microsoft Azure (US) - Cloud, AI

$GOOG (+1,59 %) Alphabet Google Cloud (US) - Cloud, ML

$VRT
Vertiv Holdings (US) - Data center infrastructure (UPS, cooling, edge)

$ORCL (-0,01 %)
Oracle Cloud (US) - ERP + Cloud

$IBM (-0,15 %)
IBM Cloud (US) - Hybrid cloud + AI

$OVH (+6,84 %)
OVHcloud (FR) - European cloud

10. software & data platforms

$PLTR (-1,16 %) Palantir (US) - data integration

$DDOG (-1,08 %) Datadog (US) - Monitoring

$SNOW (-0,41 %) Snowflake (US) - Data Cloud

$ORCL (-0,01 %) Oracle (US) - Databases, ERP

$SAP (+0,24 %) SAP (DE) - ERP systems

$SPGI S&P Global (US) - financial/market data

ROS2 Foundation - robotics middleware - not listed on the stock exchange

$NVDA (+1,94 %) NVIDIA Isaac (US) - robotics development - part of Nvidia

$INOD (-0,79 %) Innodata (US) - data annotation & AI training data

$PATH (-0,1 %)
UiPath (RO/US) - Robotic process automation

$AI (-1,47 %)
C3.ai (US) - AI platform

$ESTC (-0,28 %)
(NL/US) - Search & data analysis

11. end applications / robots

$ABB ABB (CH/SE) - Industrial robots

$6954 (+0,9 %) Fanuc (JP) - Industrial robots

$TSLA (+2,37 %) Tesla Optimus (US) - humanoid robot

$9618 (+2,58 %) JD.com (CN) - logistics robot

$AAPL (+0,35 %) Apple (US) - Platform & UX

$700 (+2,36 %) Tencent (CN) - Platform & AI

$9988 (+3,66 %) Alibaba (CN) - logistics & platform

PAL Robotics (ES) - humanoid robots - not a listed company

Neura Robotics (DE) - cognitive humanoid robots - not a listed company

$TER (+2,2 %) Universal Robots (DK) - cobots - belongs to the Teradyne Corporation

Engineered Arts (UK) - humanoid robots - not a listed company

$ISRG (-0,63 %) Intuitive Surgical (US) - surgical robotics

$GMED (-0,94 %)
Globus Medical (US) - surgical robotics (ExcelsiusGPS platform)

$7012 (-0,58 %) Kawasaki Heavy Industries (JP) - industrial robots, automation

$CPNG (+0,44 %) Coupang (KR) - Logistics end user

$IRBT (+4,76 %)
iRobot (US) - consumer robotics (e.g. Roomba), non-humanoid, but navigation/sensor fusion

Boston Dynamics (US) - humanoid & mobile robots-no listed company

Hanson Robotics (HK) - humanoid robots (Sophia) - not a listed company

Agility Robotics (US) - humanoid robot "Digit" - not a listed company

🛠 2. lateral enabler (shovel manufacturer) - with hidden champions

Raw materials & battery materials

Albemarle - Lynas - Umicore

$SQM
SQM (CL) - Lithium

$ILU (+3,83 %)
Iluka Resources (AU) - Rare earths

$ARR (+1,2 %)
American Rare Earths (US/AU) - New supply chains

production technology

ASML - Applied Materials - Tokyo Electron

$LRCX (+1,53 %)
Lam Research (US) - Plasma/etching processes

$ASM (+0,24 %)
ASM International (NL) - ALD equipment

$MKSI (+0,78 %)
MKS Instruments (US) - Plasma/vacuum technology

Quality assurance

Keysight - Advantest - Teradyne

$EMR (-0,34 %)
National Instruments (US) - Measurement technology - from Emerson Electric adopted

$300567
ATE Test Systems (CN) - test systems

$FORM (+0,8 %)
FormFactor (US) - Wafer probing

Motion & Drive

Parker-Hannifin

Festo (DE) - Pneumatics, Soft Robotics - not a listed company

Bosch Rexroth (DE) - Drives, Controls - not a listed company

$6481 (+3,06 %)
THK (JP) - Linear guides

Sensors/Imaging

$TDY Teledyne

$BSL (+1,08 %) Basler (DE) - Industrial cameras

FLIR (US) - Thermal imaging sensors - acquisition by Teledyne

ISRA Vision (DE) - Machine Vision - not a listed company

Magnets & Materials

MP Materials

$6501 (-2,14 %)
Hitachi Metals (JP) - Magnetic materials

VacuumSchmelze (DE) - Magnetic materials - not a listed company

$4063 (+2,33 %)
Shin-Etsu Chemical (JP) - Specialty Materials

Chip design & simulation

Synopsys - Cadence - ARM

$SIE (-0,89 %)
Siemens EDA (DE/US)-Mentor Graphics-strategic business unit of Siemens AG

Imagination Tech (UK) - GPU-IP - not a listed company

$CEVA (-2,24 %)
CEVA (IL) - Signal Processor IP

Engineering & Lifecycle

PTC - Dassault - Siemens

Altair (US) - Simulation - no longer a listed company

$HXGBY (-1,56 %)
Hexagon (SE) - Metrology

$SNPS (-0,93 %)
ANSYS (US) - Simulation - acquisition by Synopsys

Networks & Data Centers

Arista - Cisco - Equinix

$HPE (+0,63 %)
Juniper (US) - Networks - Acquisition of HPE

$DTE (-0,05 %)
T-Systems (DE) - Industry cloud

$OVH (+6,84 %)
OVHcloud (FR) - European cloud

Cloud infrastructure

AWS - Azure - Google Cloud

$ORCL (-0,01 %)
Oracle Cloud (US) - ERP & databases

$IBM (-0,15 %)
IBM Cloud (US) - Hybrid Cloud

$9988 (+3,66 %)
Alibaba Cloud (CN) - Asian Cloud

$VRT
Vertiv Holdings (US) - Cloud/Infra

Finance/Information Infra

S&P Global

$MCO (-0,44 %)
Moody's (US) - Ratings

$MSCI (+0,52 %)
MSCI (US) - Indices

$MORN
Morningstar (US) - Investment research

Creative/Experience Infra

Adobe

$ADSK (-0,82 %)
Autodesk (US) - CAD & Design

$U
Unity (US) - 3D/AR simulation

Epic Games (US) - Unreal Engine - not a listed company

Platform & ecosystem

Apple - Tencent - Alibaba

$META (+0,3 %)
Meta (US) - AR/VR, Social Robotics

ByteDance (CN) - AI & platforms - not a listed company

$9888 (+3,92 %)
Baidu (CN) - AI & Cloud

Infrastructure/Edge

Dell

$HPE (+0,63 %)
HPE (US) - Edge Computing

$SMCI
Supermicro (US) - AI servers

$6702 (-1,38 %)
Fujitsu (JP) - Edge & HPC

Storage solutions

Micron

$000660
SK Hynix (KR) - Memory

$285A (-0,71 %)
Kioxia (JP) - NAND

$WDC
Western Digital (US) - Storage solutions

🏛 3. secondary key sectors with hidden champions

Financing & Capital

$GS (+0,01 %) Goldman Sachs (US) - investment bank; ECM/DCM, M&A, growth financing

$MS Morgan Stanley (US) - investment bank; tech banking, capital markets

$BLK (-0,02 %) BlackRock (US) - asset manager; capital allocation, ETFs/index funds

$9984 (+0,34 %) SoftBank Vision Fund (JP) - mega VC; growth equity in robotics/AI

Sequoia Capital (US) - venture capital; early/growth in AI/robotics - this is a classic venture capital fund

DARPA (US) - government R&D funding (robotics/defense) - independent research and development agency

EU Horizon (EU) - research funding/grants for DeepTech - Innovative Europe pillar

China State Funds (CN) - state industry/technology fund

Lux Capital (US) - VC for DeepTech - Uptake (US) - AI-based predictive maintenance

DCVC (US) - Robotics & AI focus - investing exclusively via VC fund investments

Speedinvest (AT) - EU VC for robotics - access to investment only via fund investments

Maintenance & Service

$SIE (-0,89 %) Siemens (DE) - Industrial Service, Lifecycle & Retrofit

$ABBN (-0,4 %) ABB (CH/SE) - Robotics service, spare parts, field support

$GEHC (-0,11 %) GE Healthcare (US) - Medtech service incl. robotic systems

Uptake (US) - AI-based predictive maintenance - not a listed company

Augury (US/IL) - condition monitoring, condition diagnostics - not a listed company

$KU2 KUKA Service (DE) - Robotics maintenance

$6954 (+0,9 %) Fanuc Service (JP) - global service network

Boston Dynamics AI Institute (US) - Robotics longevity - funded by Hyundai Motor Group

Marketing & Advertising

$WPP (-0,86 %) WPP (UK) - global advertising group; branding/communications

$OMC Omnicom (US) - marketing/PR network

$PUB (-1,7 %) Publicis (FR) - communications/advertising group

$META (+0,3 %) Meta (US) - Digital Ads (Facebook/Instagram)

$GOOG (+1,59 %) Google Ads (US) - search & display advertising

TikTok / ByteDance (CN) - social ads & distribution - not a listed company

$AAPL (+0,35 %) Apple (US) - Branding/UX; Acceptance & Platform Marketing

$WPP (-0,86 %)
AKQA (UK/US) - Tech branding - Since 2012 majority owned by the WPP Groupbut continues to operate as an autonomous operating unit

R/GA (US) - Innovation marketing - not a listed company

Serviceplan (DE) - largest independent EU agency - not a listed company

Legal, regulation & ethics

ISO (CH) - international standards, robotics standards

TÜV (DE) - certification & safety tests

UL (US) - safety/conformity testing

EU AI Act (EU) - legal framework for AI & robotics

UNESCO AI Ethics (UN) - global ethics guidelines

Fraunhofer IPA (DE) - Robotics safety standards

ANSI (US) - standards

IEC (CH) - Electrical engineering standards

Training & Talent

MIT (US) - Robotics/AI Research & Education

ETH Zurich (CH) - autonomous systems & robotics

Stanford (US) - AI/Robotics labs & spin-offs

Tsinghua University (CN) - Robotics/AI in Asia

CMU (US) - Robotics Institute

EPFL (CH) - Robotics research

TU Munich (DE) - humanoid robot "Roboy"

🌍 Top 25 companies for humanoid robotics

These companies are central to the development & production of humanoid robotsbecause without them, crucial parts of the chain would be missing:

Chips & computing power (brain of the robots)

$NVDA (+1,94 %) Nvidia (US) - AI GPUs & Isaac platform, foundation for robotic AI

$2330 TSMC (TW) - world's most important foundry, produces the AI chips

$ASML (+0,58 %) ASML (NL) - EUV lithography, indispensable for chip production

$005930 Samsung Electronics (KR) - memory, logic, foundry

$000660 SK Hynix (KR) - DRAM & NAND memory for AI

$MU (-0,47 %) Micron (US) - Memory solutions for AI workloads

Sensors & perception (senses of robots)

$SONY Sony (JP) - Image sensors, market leader

$6861 (+2,17 %) (JP) - Industrial sensors & vision systems

$CGNX (-0,98 %) Cognex (US) - Machine vision, precise image processing

Actuators & motion (muscles of robots)

$IFX (-0,52 %) Infineon (DE) - Power electronics, motor control

$6594 (+5,42 %) Nidec (JP) - World market leader for electric motors

$PH Parker-Hannifin (US) - hydraulics/pneumatics, motion technology

$6481 (+3,06 %) THK (JP) - Linear guides & actuators

Communication, cloud & infrastructure (nerves & data flow)

$QCOM (-0,35 %) Qualcomm (US) - Mobile & Edge Chips

$AMZN (+0,11 %) Amazon AWS (US) - Cloud & AI infrastructure

$MSFT (+0,08 %) Microsoft Azure (US) - Cloud, AI services

$CSCO (+0,33 %) Cisco (US) - Networks & Security

$VRT Vertiv Holdings (US) - Data Center Infrastructure

End Applications & Platforms (robots themselves)

$TSLA (+2,37 %) Tesla (US) - humanoid robot Optimus

$ABBN (-0,4 %) ABB (CH/SE) - Robotics & Automation

$6954 (+0,9 %) Fanuc (JP) - industrial robots & CNC systems

$7012 (-0,58 %) Kawasaki Heavy Industries (JP) - industrial robots

PAL Robotics (ES) - humanoid robots (TALOS, ARI, TIAGo) - not a listed company

Neura Robotics (DE) - cognitive humanoid robots - not a listed company

Universal Robots (DK) - cobots

🇪🇺 Top 10 European key companies for humanoid robotics

$ASML (+0,58 %)
ASML (NL)

World market leader in EUV lithography - no modern chips for AI & robotics without ASML.

$IFX (-0,52 %) Infineon (DE)

Leading in power electronics & motor control - crucial for actuators of humanoid robots.

$STM (+0 %)
STMicroelectronics (FR/IT)

Sensors, microcontrollers & power chips - the basis for control & perception.

$SAP (+0,24 %)
SAP (DE)

ERP & data platforms, important for integrating humanoid robots into industrial processes.

$SIE (-0,89 %)
Siemens (DE)

Industrial software, automation, digital twin - key for engineering & lifecycle management.

$KU2 KUKA (EN)

Robotics pioneer, industrial robots & automation - know-how for humanoid motion mechanics.

PAL Robotics (ES) - not a listed company

Specialist for humanoid robots (TALOS, ARI, TIAGo), internationally used in research & service.

Neura Robotics (DE) - Not a listed company

Young high-tech company, develops cognitive humanoid robots with advanced AI (4NE-1).

Universal Robots (DK) - Not a listed company

Market leader for cobots - platform for safe human-robot collaboration.

Engineered Arts (UK) - not a listed company

Develops humanoid robots such as Amecaknown for realistic facial expressions & gestures - important for HRI (Human-Robot Interaction)

🌏 Top 10 Asian key companies for humanoid robotics

$2330
TSMC (Taiwan)

World's largest semiconductor foundry, produces high-end chips (e.g. Nvidia, AMD, Apple) - no AI hardware without TSMC.

$005930
Samsung Electronics (South Korea)

Foundry, memory, logic chips, image sensors - extremely broadly positioned in robotics components.

$000660
SK Hynix (KR) - Memory

$SONY
Sony (Japan)

Market leader in CMOS image sensors, essential for robotic vision & perception.

$6861 (+2,17 %)
Keyence (Japan)

Sensor technology & machine vision for industrial automation, widely used in robotics.

$6954 (+0,9 %)
Fanuc (Japan)

Industrial robots & CNC systems, one of the most important manufacturers of robotics hardware worldwide.

$6506 (+0,92 %)
Yaskawa Electric (Japan)

Drives, motion control & robot arms - relevant for humanoid motion control.

$6594 (+5,42 %)
Nidec (Japan)

World market leader for electric motors (from mini motors to high-performance drives).

$7012 (-0,58 %)
Kawasaki Heavy Industries (JP) - Industrial robots

$9618 (+2,58 %)
JD.com (China)

Driver for robotics in e-commerce & logistics, invests in humanoid robotics applications