The humanoid robot race just got a new affordable competitor! EngineAI’s PM01 has been spotted taking a casual stroll through the streets of Shenzhen, demonstrating impressively fluid walking capabilities at a price point that might shock the industry. Starting at just $13,700, this 138cm tall bipedal bot packs some serious specs into its modest 40kg frame, including over 23 degrees of freedom, extraordinarily wide angular range of motion, and a peak torque density of 130N•M/KG.
What makes the PM01 particularly interesting is its adaptability and openness. The robot features highly expandable hardware with USB and RJ45 interfaces to connect external devices like laser radar, ultrasonic sensors, and vision modules. On the software side, it’s compatible with both Windows and Ubuntu, while running on Intel N97 X86 and NVIDIA Jetson Orin platforms. EngineAI is also taking the open-source approach, providing training code based on Isaac Sim and MuJoCo, potentially accelerating development in the humanoid robotics community.
With 5-DOF arms, 6-DOF legs, and an impressive 300° rotation angle at the waist, the PM01 demonstrates remarkable flexibility. The robot leverages optical motion capture to collect human movement data, then uses neural networks and adversarial learning to rapidly evolve in simulated environments. At this price point, EngineAI could be positioning itself to challenge both the high-end humanoid makers like Tesla and Figure, as well as more affordable competitors in the rapidly expanding bipedal robot market.