WAIC 2026 Takeaways: More Physical AI

Research evidence excerpt

WAIC 2026 Takeaways: More Physical AI

Idea

July 20, 2026 05:21 PM GMT

Morgan Stanley Asia Limited+MChina Industrials | Asia Pacific Sheng Zhong

Equity Analyst

WAIC 2026 Takeaways: More Sheng.Zhong@morganstanley.comCarlos Chai +852 2239-7821

Research Associate

Carlos.Chai@morganstanley.com +852 3963-3180

Physical AI Chelsea Wang

Jinlin.Wang@morganstanley.com +852 2239-1118

Physical AI in China, including industrial AI solutions, humanoids Andy Huang

& robotics, and new AI hardware, continues to iterate quickly, ResearchHuang.Andy@morganstanley.comAssociate +65 6834-6446

driving incremental demand across layers, supporting industrial

capex.

WAIC 2026, held in Shanghai on July 17–20, brought together >1,000 companies.

President Xi delivered his first-ever keynote at this event, highlighting the importance

of global AI governance. He emphasized China's support for AI innovation and the China Industrials

Asia Pacific

multiple "AI plus" initiatives to build industry ecosystems. AI should not be a single- Industry View In-Line

country performance but a product of global cooperation. He also announced the

launch of WAICO and 5,000 training opportunities for developing countries.

Robotics/smart hardware was the most crowded field, accounting for 24% of

participating companies, followed by compute, chip & infra (20%), and industry AI

applications (13%), according to Jazzyear (a tech-focus thinktank).

Industrial agentic solutions is an emerging field. It now concentrates on

operational monitoring and decision support, and is gradually expanding into

engineering automation. As AI agents begin to generate measurable productivity

gains, we believe this will drive a shift to subscription-based recurring revenue and

equipment upgrades.