The Financial Times published an opinion piece by Tej Parikh in late June, "Robots, not chatbots, will realise AI's potential," arguing that the economic potential of AI will be unlocked not by generative chatbots but by robots operating in the physical world, particularly on the factory floor.
Physical AI · The Next Frontier
Robots, Not Chatbots, Will Realise AI's Potential
Conversational LLMs have raced ahead on text — but stall at acting in the real world. The next stage belongs to embodied AI: humanoids that learn by doing, powered by "world models" that simulate physical laws. The rollout accelerates through 2026.
1M
Tesla Optimus units/year targeted via mass production
5,000+
Unitree humanoids shipped in 2025
10B+
Parameters for world models learning physical simulation
Humanoid Rollout · 2025 → 2027
Figure AI — Figure 02 / F.03
Deployed at BMW
Helix VLM enables operation via language commands · client expansion mid-2026
Tesla Optimus — Gen 3
Unveiled Apr 2026
Low cost via mass production · up to 1M units/year potential
Boston Dynamics — Atlas
Ships 2026
Initial shipments to Hyundai & Google DeepMind · more customers early 2027
1X — NEO
Delivers 2026
First customer deliveries · 10,000 units/year planned at US plant
Unitree
5,000+ shipped 2025
Low-cost, high-volume strategy · many models still aimed at education & research
The Technical Recipe
Pairing language understanding with simulated physics to give robots a "ChatGPT moment."
VLM
Vision-language models read images + text for language instructions
+
WORLD MODEL
Internally simulates physical laws for prediction & planning (10B+ params)
→
EMBODIED AI
Robots that fail, learn and act in the physical world
The Promise
Unlike text-only LLMs, robots fail and learn in the real world
Concrete uses: car assembly at BMW, home assistance
Market takeoff expected 2026 in manufacturing & warehousing
The Hurdles
"Robotics Data Gap" — scarce real-world interaction data
Fragile generalisation & hardware fragmentation
Sim-to-real gap; commercial rollouts stay phased and limited
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