Spending 100 million on the Spring Festival Gala, did the magic atom before the IPO wipe out the founder?

(Source: Nanchai Society)

Spending over 100 million yuan on the Spring Festival Gala, Magic Atom didn’t become as quickly popular as expected—in fact, its founder even lost his position.

After this year’s “Robot Spring Festival Gala,” a big rumor started circulating in the robotics circle:

A leading humanoid robot company that debuted at the 2026 CCTV Spring Festival Gala was unable to meet expectations with its 100 million yuan investment, leading to a fierce argument between investors and the founding team during a core management meeting after the holiday.

Although the rumor has been around for a while, the details are vague, and outsiders are unsure which company it refers to. However, there are only four humanoid robot companies that participated in the Spring Festival Gala, so the scope is quite narrow.

At this moment, Magic Atom suddenly announced the departure of its founder, which in the public eye is seen as implicitly confirming the rumor.

On March 5th, Magic Atom officially confirmed to the media that founder and former CEO Wu Changzheng has resigned. They also announced a new executive team, signaling stability in management and technical teams after the founder’s departure.

Notably, earlier, co-founder Gu Shitao stated that the company is accelerating its IPO schedule, with potential news in the secondary market as early as 2026.

Having been established for just over two years, the sudden departure of the founder before the IPO raises questions: what exactly happened to this robotics company?

01

Disputes sparked by the Gala

Wu Changzheng’s resignation indirectly confirms the earlier rumor and reveals the reason behind his departure:

A fierce quarrel between investors and the founding team.

The founding team undoubtedly includes Wu Changzheng. The investor is the recently much-discussed company in the tech industry, Zhunmi.

Although Magic Atom was founded just over two years ago, its core team is not unknown. It originates from the research team behind Xiaomi’s bionic quadruped robot CyberDog “Tie Dan,” and can be considered to have “star genes” from the start.

Wu Changzheng is a veteran in the robotics field, with over a decade of experience. He graduated with a master’s in robotics from Shanghai Jiao Tong University and was among the earliest in China to participate in the commercialization of quadruped robots in 2018. He has served as R&D head for Xiaomi’s robotics team and Pudu Technology’s quadruped robot development lead, leading projects like “Tie Dan,” with deep expertise in hardware and software R&D and industrialization.

It’s worth noting that the investor behind Wu Changzheng’s Magic Atom, Zhunmi, also has roots in Xiaomi’s ecosystem. It initially did OEM work for Xiaomi before gradually developing its own brand.

Two teams with Xiaomi backgrounds joined forces but ultimately ended up parting ways. The apparent trigger was the underwhelming performance of the Gala Gala’s robot deployment.

As early as December last year, media reports indicated that several humanoid robot companies had begun competing for sponsorship slots at the 2026 Spring Festival Gala, with fierce competition. According to multiple media outlets citing industry insiders, the cost for robot companies to secure a partnership at the 2026 Gala ranged from 60 million to 100 million yuan. Magic Atom, as a strategic partner, was estimated to have invested close to 100 million yuan.

Money was spent, faces were revealed, search volume increased, but the results fell short of expectations.

On JD.com, compared to companies like Yu Shu and Song Yan Power, Magic Atom’s search volume increased significantly, but actual sales showed little improvement—only the cheapest robot dog had sold one unit. Other products labeled as “hot-selling” had no real sales data, and reviews were sparse, mostly default positive comments.

This mainly relates to the purpose and price. In fact, during the robot boom last year, doubts were raised: most robots are currently only suitable for performances and cannot be applied to other scenarios, let alone replace humans.

And the prices are not cheap. Currently, Xiaomi’s Mi Robot and Yu Shu’s robot dog are below 10,000 yuan, while Magic Atom’s cheapest robot dog costs 24,999 yuan.

02

Rumors of disagreements with shareholders?

Management step-back six months before departure

The Gala is just the surface; Wu Changzheng’s resignation has deeper reasons.

According to insiders, the core reason for his departure was “disagreements with shareholders over the company’s development philosophy.” Given that this is a critical window for humanoid robot industrialization, he ultimately chose to start his own venture.

Some analysts suggest that, as a technical founder, Wu Changzheng prefers a long-term R&D approach focused on general-purpose humanoid robots, emphasizing increased investment in core technologies and overcoming fundamental technical bottlenecks. Meanwhile, the shareholders are more focused on commercialization and capitalizing on the industry’s key inflection point in 2026, prioritizing order volume, revenue, and profitability.

Magic Atom denies this characterization.

However, Wu Changzheng had already been planning to leave. An insider revealed that before his resignation, he had gradually distanced himself from the management team over the past six months.

Business registration information supports this. Tianyancha shows that since January this year, Wu Changzheng has resigned from multiple positions within Magic Atom’s affiliated companies:

In mid-January 2026, Wu Changzheng resigned as General Manager of Magic Atom Robot Technology (Wuxi) Co., Ltd., remaining only as a director;

In February, he resigned from director roles at Magic Atom’s branches in Shanghai, Wuhan, Suzhou, and Hangzhou, as well as from director at Singularity Workshop Robot Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd.;

On March 4th, Wu Changzheng officially resigned as director and General Manager of the parent company, Magic Atom Robot Technology (Wuxi) Co., Ltd.

By then, Wu Changzheng had completed a full separation from several core entities of Magic Atom.

03

Anxieties at Zhunmi

Although Magic Atom denies “disagreements with shareholders,” its actions suggest it is more inclined to accelerate commercialization to help shareholders realize returns.

In January this year, co-founder Gu Shitao said that Magic Atom is rapidly advancing its IPO schedule, with potential news in the secondary market in 2026.

Just days after Wu Changzheng’s departure was confirmed, Magic Atom announced a new round of 500 million yuan funding. Meanwhile, the company’s billion-yuan ecosystem fund has established a presence in Wuxi, focusing on embodied intelligence applications with a “funding + fundraising” dual approach, mobilizing over 10.5 billion yuan in total capital.

This signals that “even with the founder gone, the company can still raise funds and go public,” offering some reassurance.

Behind this, there is also investor anxiety. The investment still comes from Zhunmi: the lead investor, Sky Venture Capital, was previously known as Zhunmi’s venture fund, which invested in Magic Atom in 2024 and 2025.

In January 2024, Wu Changzheng officially founded Magic Atom, raising two rounds of several hundred million yuan within less than two years. The key investor was Zhunmi.

In August 2024, Zhunmi launched a 11 billion yuan robotics industry venture fund (CETA). In December, its industry investment arm, Chuangchuang Venture Capital, led a 150 million yuan angel round for Magic Atom.

In 2025, at the launch of Magic Atom’s humanoid robot Xiaomai, the first factories to adopt it were those partnered with Zhunmi, collecting real data together.

From angel funding to subsequent rounds, and now to capacity and data collaborations, Zhunmi has been nurturing Magic Atom.

Now, with the IPO news out, the founder’s departure raises concerns about future funding and listing prospects.

Most critically, 2026 is seen as a pivotal year for humanoid robot commercialization. According to Gaogong Robotics Industry Research Institute, domestic humanoid robot shipments are expected to reach 18,000 units in 2025—an increase of over 650% from 2024—and could climb to 62,500 units in 2026. This means fierce industry competition is imminent.

In this context, Magic Atom faces significant challenges.

First, mass production and shipment pressures. Wu Changzheng publicly stated in 2025 that Magic Atom planned to produce 400 humanoid robots that year for industrial and commercial applications. But by early 2026, IDC data still categorized Magic Atom as having “over a hundred units shipped.” In comparison, Yu Shu shipped over 5,500 units in 2025, and Zhiyuan’s total shipments exceeded 5,100 units.

Additionally, companies like Tesla with its Optimus, Xpeng’s new IRON robot, and UBTECH’s Walker S2 plan to achieve large-scale production in 2026, with capacities reaching tens of thousands.

On the technological front, Magic Atom’s competitive moat isn’t very deep. Its self-developed MagicHand S01, with 11 degrees of freedom in one hand, a load capacity of 5 kg, and a maximum payload of over 20 kg in operational scenarios, lags behind competitors like Yu Shu’s Dex5 with 20 degrees of freedom and Zhiyuan’s OmniHand with 19 degrees of freedom, which have higher potential in fine manipulation and generalization.

However, as mentioned earlier, most humanoid robots are still mainly used for performances; truly replacing human labor in factories is still a long way off.

In the short term, the biggest challenge for the robotics industry remains cash flow. The industry has yet to achieve large-scale mass production or a profitable model. Despite heavy marketing investments, Magic Atom’s results are not as good as those of leading companies like Yu Shu. How long it can sustain depends largely on the patience of its backer, Zhunmi.

From a Xiaomi-star team to heavy investment from Zhunmi, to the billion-yuan exposure at the Gala and the founder’s departure—Magic Atom’s story is a microcosm of the current humanoid robot industry: high enthusiasm, significant bubbles, and a game of technology and capital just beginning.