Chinese company Unitree once again took the public's breath away when it unveiled a robot in a video that can leap over a two-meter bar from a standing start and run at a speed no human has ever achieved. The machine is called Superman, and two days later Unitree shares began trading on the Shanghai Stock Exchange for the first time, soaring by more than six hundred percent within minutes.
Superman and Record-Breaking Figures
Unitree says Superman has a top speed of 12.66 meters per second, which is roughly 45.6 kilometers per hour. By comparison, Usain Bolt reached a peak speed of approximately 12.42 meters per second during his 2009 world-record run, completing the 100 meters in 9.58 seconds. If the robot could maintain its top speed over the entire distance, it would win with a time of 7.90 seconds. Its second record is a standing jump to a height of two meters, surpassing the human record in this discipline despite the machine's legs measuring just 85 centimeters.
Unitree describes Superman as a prototype rather than a product, and according to the company, its development took just over three months, with the machine set to continue improving. Its design is built around a single goal: movement speed. The robot cannot perform any useful tasks in a factory or at home.
The pace of progress is clearly evident when compared with last year: at the inaugural World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing in August 2025, Unitree's fastest machine managed to run at 4.78 meters per second, a figure that, according to the company, has roughly tripled in just one year.
Record Demand for Shares
On August 19, the company, officially known as Yushu Technology, began trading on Shanghai's STAR Market for technology companies. The offering price was set at 150.80 yuan per share, and by selling approximately 40 million shares, representing a tenth of the company, Unitree raised 6.1 billion yuan, equivalent to about 905 million dollars, even though it had originally planned to raise 4.2 billion yuan.
Demand from retail investors exceeded supply by more than eight thousand times, setting a new record for the STAR Market. Trading opened at approximately 1,100 yuan, 629 percent above the offering price, and the company's value briefly climbed to 445 billion yuan, or approximately 66 billion dollars. However, the trend then reversed, and the shares ended the day at 845 yuan, up around 460 percent, valuing the company at roughly 50 billion dollars. As a result, anyone who bought immediately after the market opened found themselves at a loss within minutes.
Founder Wang Xingxing, who is 36 years old, holds approximately 121.4 million shares. At the close of trading, his stake was worth about 103 billion yuan. However, investor enthusiasm is based on revenue that reportedly reached around 250 million dollars last year, with most of the machines sold going to research institutions and demonstration events.
Sources: businessinsider.com and reuters.com
