Agility Robotics’ Nasdaq listing highlights risks in humanoid market

Agility Robotics became the first dedicated humanoid-robot developer to become a publicly traded company in the United States when its shares began trading on Nasdaq on November 5. The company, based in Salem, Oregon, had previously reported the first full-time commercial deployment of humanoid robots at a customer warehouse, in 2024.

A securities filing accompanying the listing describes the challenges facing the business. Unlike industrial robots, which have decades of established use in factories and warehouses, humanoid robots have not yet demonstrated large-scale performance or achieved broad commercialization. Agility plans to generate revenue by renting out or selling robots designed to carry out manual labor.

Jonathan Hurst, the company’s co-founder and chief robot officer, said a robots-as-a-service model could reduce the customer’s risk because payment would be tied to a rate comparable to human labor costs. He said this structure could allow customers to see a return on investment from the first day. The filing provides financial disclosures about the company’s planned business model but also identifies the limited maturity of the humanoid-robot market as a risk.