“2025 will be the year of the robot: robots and autonomous hardware companies will be the biggest business winner of the year. I think this is going to be the year where we're all going to look at humanoid robots and autonomous systems and be like, 'Oh my God, I can't believe this is here.'”

David FriedbergInvestor

CEO of Ohalo Genetics, founder of The Production Board, co-host of the All-In podcast

Autonomous systems did have a breakout year — Waymo scaled sharply and Tesla launched supervised robotaxi service in Austin — and robotics valuations and funding soared (Unitree revenue more than quadrupled). But humanoid robots did not arrive: the International Federation of Robotics counted only about 7,000 humanoids sold worldwide for industrial and professional use in 2025, Tesla built a few hundred Optimus units against a 5,000-unit goal, and 2025's biggest business winners were AI chip and hyperscaler names (Alphabet +65%, Nvidia +39%).