Nvidia
Nvidia supplies the compute and foundation models used by most Western humanoid makers: the Isaac GR00T family of humanoid foundation models (N1 in March 2025, N1.5 and N1.6 later in 2025), the Jetson Thor onboard computer (generally available August 2025 at USD 3,499 for the developer kit) and Isaac Sim and Cosmos for simulation and synthetic data. It is also an investor in Figure AI and other humanoid startups.
- Type
- big tech
- Headquarters
- Santa Clara, California, United States
- Founded
- 1993
- Founders
- Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky, Curtis Priem
- Status
- active
- Employees (est.)
- n/d
- Disclosed funding
- n/d
- Valuation
- n/d
- Listed
- NASDAQ: NVDA
- Website
- nvidia.com
What the record says.
Nvidia is the Santa Clara chip company founded in 1993 by Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky and Curtis Priem and listed on Nasdaq. It does not build humanoids, but it has positioned itself as the toolmaker for everyone who does: the onboard computer, the simulation software, the synthetic-data models and an open family of robot control models called Isaac GR00T.
The pieces have arrived steadily. GR00T N1 was released in March 2025 as an open vision-language-action model, followed by N1.5 and N1.6, which folds in the Cosmos Reason vision-language model; the GitHub repository is now at N1.7. Jetson Thor, the Blackwell-based robot computer, went on general sale on 25 August 2025 with a developer kit from 3,499 US dollars and 2,070 FP4 teraflops in a 130 watt envelope, and Nvidia named Agility, Amazon Robotics, Boston Dynamics, Figure and Meta among early adopters.
On 31 May 2026 it went a step closer to hardware with the Isaac GR00T Reference Humanoid Robot, a Unitree H2 Plus body with Sharpa Wave tactile hands and a Thor T5000 module, to be sold by Unitree from late 2026 to research labs such as ETH Zurich and Stanford. Nvidia also invests in humanoid startups, including Figure AI, through its venture arm.
Milestones.
CES 2026: humanoids from Boston Dynamics, Nvidia partners and Chinese makers
CES 2026 in Las Vegas features a new production oriented Atlas from Boston Dynamics and Hyundai, Nvidia's updated robotics stack and a large presence of Chinese humanoid makers. Placeholder pending verification.
Figure raises over 1 billion dollars at a 39 billion valuation
Parkway Venture Capital leads the Series C, with Nvidia, Brookfield, Intel Capital, LG Technology Ventures, Macquarie, Qualcomm Ventures, Salesforce and T-Mobile Ventures. The valuation is fifteen times the 2024 Series B.
Nvidia releases GR00T N1, an open humanoid foundation model
At GTC 2025 Nvidia releases GR00T N1, described as the first open, fully customisable foundation model for humanoid reasoning and skills, with 1X demonstrating it on NEO. It is followed by GR00T N1.5 and N1.6 in the same year.
Nvidia opens CES 2025 with Cosmos and fourteen humanoids on stage
Jensen Huang presents the Cosmos world foundation models and Isaac tools flanked by humanoids from Agility, Apptronik, Figure, 1X, Fourier, Unitree, Galbot, XPeng, Sanctuary and others. Humanoids are the dominant robotics theme of the show.
Nvidia announces Project GR00T, a foundation model for humanoids
At GTC 2024 Jensen Huang presents Project GR00T, a general purpose foundation model for humanoid robots, together with the Jetson Thor computer and a stage full of partner robots from 1X, Agility, Apptronik, Boston Dynamics, Figure, Fourier, Sanctuary, Unitree and XPeng. Nvidia positions itself as the platform supplier for the sector.
Figure raises 675 million dollars at a 2.6 billion valuation
Microsoft, OpenAI Startup Fund, Nvidia, Jeff Bezos, Intel Capital and others back the Series B, and Figure announces a collaboration with OpenAI to develop AI models for its robots. It is the largest humanoid round to date.
Figure AI: what $39 billion has shown so far
Four rounds, $1,754,000,000 raised, one named customer, no price and no unit count. The record on the most valuable humanoid company, generation by generation.
How a humanoid robot works: actuators, compute, sensors and the model
Of 182 humanoids on record, 178 say what moves the joints and 43 say what computer is inside. The further a layer sits from the metal, the less the maker tells you about it.
Startups, automakers, universities: who builds humanoids
108 makers, nine kinds. Startups hold 37 of the 44 humanoids you can order. Automakers, universities, big tech, conglomerates and NASA hold 45 robots between them and sell none of them.
Who is paying for humanoids: 69 funding rounds
Our funding record holds 69 entries. Take out the government funds, the acquisitions and the IPOs and $6.33 billion of disclosed private money remains. 37 percent of it went to companies with no robot on record.
China builds, America demos: what 108 makers tell you
Chinese makers account for 65 of the 182 humanoids in our record and 31 of the 44 you can order. American makers hold the money, the research and most of the autonomy claims, and sell you almost nothing.
Humanoid robot stocks: which of the 108 makers are actually listed
Twenty of the 108 makers in our record have a ticker. Four of them will sell you a humanoid. The rest build cars, chips, servers and washing machines, and the pure plays are all private.
Sources
- 01Isaac GR00TNvidia
- 02
- 03
- 04GR00T N1.6Nvidia Research
- 05