Yao Action raises 240m yuan in angel round

On August 28, an announcement from Inceptio Technology tied a financing deal to specific vehicles and routes: its subsidiary Yao Action completed a 240 million yuan angel round, with the funds earmarked for physical artificial intelligence R&D, the development and operation of unmanned logistics vehicles, team expansion and day-to-day operations. Yao Action was registered on June 29 this year and will pursue the business as an independent subsidiary.

Its bet is not on artificial intelligence that only answers questions on a screen, but on machines capable of performing tasks in real-world environments. Unmanned logistics vehicles will first handle transportation in warehouses, industrial parks and urban roads. Under its plans, the company will later explore linking them with quadruped robots, extending deliveries from warehouses to customers’ doorsteps. A report from the Smart Logistics Committee of the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing shows that China had 50,000 unmanned delivery vehicles in operation as of the first quarter of 2026, up about 51.5% from the end of 2025. The cumulative fleet is expected to exceed 2 million vehicles by 2030.

Yao Action is not building its technology from scratch. It inherits Inceptio Technology’s accumulated perception, decision-making and planning algorithms in L4 autonomous driving. Inceptio Technology says the Xiaozhu T5 Pro is China’s first mass-produced and commercially deployed “genuinely map-free” L4 unmanned logistics vehicle, relying only on a basic navigation map and real-time perception to handle complex urban road conditions. The Xiaozhu A6 Pro, developed jointly with Yunnei Power, is described as the industry’s first mass-produced and commercially deployed map-free L4 autonomous refrigerated vehicle. The Xiaozhu T5 Pro has been deployed in eight cities: Nantong, Zibo, Luoyang, Taiyuan, Zhangjiakou, Danyang, Jiyuan and Foshan.

Another distinctive feature of the round is its investor mix. Dongfeng Asset Management, Horizon Robotics, the CICC Porsche Fund, along with several industrial funds and professional institutions, provide connections to complete-vehicle manufacturing, automotive-grade chips, advanced manufacturing, local industries and investment institutions. Inceptio Technology reported total revenue of 450 million yuan in the first half of 2026, including 53 million yuan in revenue from unmanned-vehicle operating services, up 423.4% year on year. The figures indicate that the business has moved from use-case pilots into a phase of revenue expansion, but they come from the company’s disclosures; the future scale of Yao Action itself remains to be seen.

Specifically, according to the company’s disclosures, the financing is expected to accelerate deployment: R&D, vehicle production and use-case expansion will receive funding and industry support. Inceptio Technology has partnered with Didi Freight to connect to a local freight network, is advancing unmanned delivery services and an autonomous-driving logistics vehicle production base in Foshan, and is working with Star Charge to build an integrated system combining vehicle-side autonomous driving and charging-site energy. Yao Action plans to bring unmanned delivery products to mass production and commercial validation in the short term, then expand into unmanned transportation, quadruped robots and inspection robots over the medium to long term. These remain plans; the real test will be whether it can continue securing orders, accumulating data and operating reliably in more cities.