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US robotics firms have urged the White House to draft a national robotics strategy in order to counter China, but executives said they don’t expect any major policy pushes until President Donald Trump meets with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in a Beijing summit that’s been postponed over the Iran war.
Trump proposed holding the meeting in a month, but the uncertain timeline of the Middle East conflict risks further delays to the talks and, by extension, efforts to advance China-related proposals.
“There’s a pause right now on all anti-China-related policy steps with the upcoming meeting,” one robotics industry executive told Semafor before the summit was delayed, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss conversations with the administration. “We’re just sort of in a hold on doing anything significant.”
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Robotics is already shaping up to be a battleground in US-China competition, as the two countries race to dominate the AI future.
But it’s still a nascent industry. Humanoids aren’t yet in households and autonomous industrial robots haven’t become commonplace on American factory floors, placing the sector in a somewhat awkward position: acknowledging that competition from China isn’t killing the American robotics industry yet, but arguing that it could, if Washington does nothing.
China has built up its humanoid sector in recent years, positioning it as a new driver of growth alongside AI. Chinese factories are installing robots at a rapid clip — more than the rest of the world combined — while flashy robot dance performances have served as a kind of global wakeup about how fast Chinese industry is evolving.
“This is going to define the future for the species,” said Jeff Cardenas, the CEO of Texas-based robot maker Apptronik. “It’s game on.”
In the US, the industry is lobbying Washington to urgently take action, four executives at American robotics companies said. It’s unclear how receptive the Trump administration is, but industry proposals include direct federal support to boost the domestic sector, as well as tariffs or a ban on Chinese bots.
US firms point to the potential for security risks in Chinese bots, as well as the threats that cheaper Chinese imports could pose to American businesses, both in the US and in overseas battlegrounds like Europe.
“I don’t think we’ve ever competed against a Chinese robot as of today,” said Evan Beard, CEO of Standard Bots, which focuses on industrial automation tools. That gives the US “a moment in time” to prevent a repeat of what happened with drones, in which Chinese dominance outpaced US policy response, with Shenzhen-based DJI capturing nearly 80% of the US market.
“We believe this is an issue policymakers… should treat now, not later. Tariffs become ineffective when no domestic options exist,” added Daniel Diez, chief business officer of robot-maker Agility.
Specific proposals for government action vary; some companies only support tariffing finished robots, rather than the whole supply chain. Beard has been the most outspoken CEO in support of measures to blunt Chinese competition through either an outright ban or tariffs throughout the supply chain that are proportional to any government subsidies.
The US robotics industry has received attention from some in the administration: Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has reportedly shown interest in helping, and his agency recently hosted a robotics roundtable involving dozens of US firms.
The roundtable covered “supply chain concerns and policy challenges,” and “we’ll be sharing our insights with others in the US government to inform future work,” a National Telecommunications and Information Administration spokesperson said. But the agency said it is not looking to overlap with separate work on tariffs that may be underway elsewhere in the administration.
The executive who spoke on condition of anonymity said that the administration doesn’t have a singular point of contact for robotics, and added that Trump wouldn’t be able to instantly tariff Chinese bots if he wanted to, because humanoid robots don’t yet have their own import classification code.
In response to questions about the US’ robotics strategy, the White House directed Semafor to its AI Action Plan, which identifies robotics as one of the “new innovations in the physical world,” and states the government “prioritize investment in these emerging technologies and usher in a new industrial renaissance.”
J.D.’s view
The conversation in Washington around robotics provides a window into broader US-China relations.
The Commerce Department is paying attention to robotics, and Congress has seen a bipartisan willingness to more aggressively take on China: A number of recently proposed bills are aimed at curbing Chinese influence across robotics.
More broadly, the Trump administration has shown a willingness to embrace industrial policy to bolster critical industries like rare earths — but that’s usually only after a moment of crisis, like China tightening mineral export controls, rather than a proactive step.
Room for Disagreement
The US robotics sector isn’t doomed, and still has a good shot of taking the lead in physical AI, some analysts argue.
While China’s robot choreography is impressive, “there is not a very big market for dancing robots,” Semafor Tech Editor Reed Albergotti wrote earlier this year. “And dancing does not necessarily translate into actually useful tasks, except perhaps raising venture capital.”
The US also has a lead on the software side, which will define the future of the industry, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and China tech analyst Selina Xu argued this month.
American firms “may still outpace Chinese competitors by focusing on software breakthroughs over sheer hardware volume,” they wrote in Time magazine.