Wang Xingxing's Nine-Year Journey to a Ten-Thousand-Fold Success: From Being Excluded to Sitting in the Front Row

By: Jia Liu, Zhang Sheng BeatZ

The Internet Conference in Wuzhen in December 2017 was perhaps the most lively one ever held.

A group photo from a dinner party went viral on the internet at the time, featuring top entrepreneurs from the internet industry, organized by Liu Qiangdong and Wang Xing, famously known as the "Dongxing Dinner Party."

Wuzhen in 2017, the "Dongxing Party" became a highlight moment in mobile internet history.

The combined wealth of the attendees was 700 billion, yet shortly after the "Dongxing Party" ended, fierce internal competition in the internet sector officially began. This marked what seemed to be the last grand group photo of the peak era of the internet, after which the Chinese internet began to decline.

What many do not know is that on the same day as the Dongxing Dinner Party at the Wuzhen Internet Conference, there was another small gathering for afternoon tea, where a "tech newcomer" made an appearance.

This person was Wang Xingxing.

Geek Afternoon Tea, from left: Chen Hua from Changba, Mi Wenshuan from VIPKID, Zhang Peng from Geek Park, Lei Jun, Zhou Yuan from Zhihu, Wang Xing, Wang Xingxing.

That gathering was organized by Zhang Peng from Geek Park, held outside the conference venue. At that time, no one recognized Wang Xingxing, who sat on the far right; netizens remembered him because his name was similar to Wang Xing.

According to Zhang Peng's later recollection, Wang Xingxing could not even enter the main conference hall at that time. Zhang Peng called him over to show the seniors the robotic dog he had created. After everyone had chatted for a while, he let Wang Xingxing demonstrate the company's first robotic dog, Laikago, but the robot got stuck at the threshold and crashed. Wang Xingxing had to reboot it for a long time, creating an awkward moment.

"Xingxing was a bit shy at that time, and it seemed he didn't even add the WeChat accounts of the big shots." At that time, Yushu Technology had just been established for a year, and there was less than half of the money left in the company's account.

However, the tide of the times was surging, one wave after another, passing from one generation to the next. As Huang Renxun said, in the next five years, the number of millionaires created by artificial intelligence will exceed the number created by the internet in the past 20 years.

Today, nine years later, Yushu Technology has opened subscription on the STAR Market, with a market value exceeding 60 billion, and Wang Xingxing holds a total of 33.36% of the shares, corresponding to a fortune of about 20 billion.

Looking back at that noisy Internet Conference in Wuzhen, it marked the end of an era and the beginning of another.

200 Yuan Handcrafted Robot

Wang Xingxing was born in March 1990 into an ordinary family in Yuyao, Zhejiang.

He later recounted this period: "Unlike what many people imagine, I am not a top student, especially in English. Although I have always worked hard, I only passed three times in three years of high school. Some even said that this child seems a bit slower than others. I also doubted myself and was filled with anxiety." His English teacher once said in front of his mother that this child was a bit slow.

Wang Xingxing spent all his spare time making things. At 10, he made a wind-powered car from scrap cardboard, and at 15, he made a miniature engine and model aircraft from scrap metal.

In 2009, Wang Xingxing was admitted to Zhejiang University of Technology, majoring in mechanical and electrical engineering, but he said he felt inferior because he attended an ordinary university.

Early photo of Wang Xingxing.

That winter, he first encountered microcontrollers and used his pocket money to buy an Arduino board for a few dozen yuan. During the winter vacation, he bought over ten 9-gram servos and started making a bipedal robot.

Video uploaded by Wang Xingxing on Youku.

Without equipment, he used a manual drill, file, and scissors. Without funds, he bought parts for 9 yuan and scavenged leftover materials from others. Without a machine to polish, he manually rubbed the parts on the ground, leaving his hands rough.

In the end, he made a bipedal humanoid robot with 14 degrees of freedom, which could barely walk and perform a few simple actions. The total cost was only 200 yuan. The following summer, he spent 300 yuan to make a set of force feedback gloves and a dexterous hand, paired with a 3D virtual reality interaction software. Again, everything was done manually, with no electric tools used.

Less than 20,000 Yuan XDog

In his senior year, he took the entrance exam for graduate school, with Zhejiang University as his first choice for mechanical engineering. Wang Xingxing scored enough to meet the cutoff but was transferred to Shanghai University because he did not pass the English score set by Zhejiang University.

Netizens later created a joke about his company name: Yushu, because he was good at "language and math" but poor in "foreign languages."

Years later, Tian Jiangchuan from Chuangxin Capital would admit in an internal review that he first met Wang Xingxing in 2017 at Shanghai Hongqiao Railway Station, but hesitated to invest due to the "Shanghai University" and "grassroots background," which did not match industry needs and fund preferences. It wasn't until 2019 that he learned from Professor Yu Yang of Nanjing University that many AI laboratories were purchasing from Yushu, even finding it "hard to get a dog," and Chuangxin Capital finally completed a Pre-A investment in early 2020.

In his first year of graduate school, he made a high-dynamic mechanical leg. His advisor, Jia Wenchuan, provided him with about 10,000 to 20,000 yuan in research funding, and Wang Xingxing developed the XDog.

During those years, the only high-performance quadruped robot in the world was Boston Dynamics: hydraulic drive, large size, loud noise, and exorbitant prices, primarily serving military and government orders. Wang Xingxing took a different path, using his designed outer rotor brushless motor for a direct drive solution. The entire machine cost less than 20,000 yuan.

In 2015, he publicly shared this electric drive solution, about a year before Boston Dynamics switched to electric drive.

Also in late 2015, he saw a report on quadruped robots in IEEE Spectrum and casually posted the link to his XDog YouTube video in the comments section.

Wang Xingxing in the graduate lab.

After graduating, Wang Xingxing interned at DJI, but during this time, his XDog video on YouTube gained popularity, attracting many investors who encouraged him to start a business. After two to three months at DJI, he resigned.

After leaving, he spent a month in Shenzhen to discuss financing, which he described as his most anxious month. Although he secured investment intentions, the funds had not yet arrived, and the initial team consisted of only three to four people, with the company not yet registered.

The first money arrived during this time. The investor, Yin Fangming, had previously worked as a product manager and director at MediaTek, Sohu, and Qihoo 360, and co-founded an early-stage fund focused on smart hardware in 2014. In November 2016, he invested 2 million yuan as an individual, acquiring 15% of Yushu's shares, corresponding to a post-investment valuation of 13.33 million yuan.

Wang Xingxing later recalled this investment to "Wandian": "He approached me. The terms he offered were very flexible. When he transferred the money, we didn't even sign an agreement."

In April 2018, Yin Fangming transferred part of his shares to Shenzhen Anchuan Technology for 1.3105 million yuan. In August 2020, he transferred the remaining registered capital to Tianjin Junwan Hongyi, completely exiting the Yushu shareholder list from a business perspective. However, his name remained on the list of investors in Junwan Hongyi, and he still held about 16.62% of the shares after penetration.

Although he changed from a direct shareholder to an indirect fund investor, Junwan Hongyi remains Yushu's tenth-largest shareholder, holding about 11.17 million shares, with a market value of approximately 1.684 billion yuan based on the issuance price, corresponding to about 280 million yuan for Yin Fangming's portion.

Binjiang, Wuzhen

In Wuzhen in 2017, the backdrop was Tencent.

That year, the most viral Dongxing Party had Tencent shareholders from most of the companies at the table, including JD.com, Meituan, Didi, and Zhihu. The capital landscape of the Chinese internet at that time was essentially laid out on that round table.

In July 2019, two years later, Dexion Investment, founded by Tencent co-founder Zeng Liqing, acquired 4% of Yushu's shares for 4 million yuan.

That afternoon tea later proved to be the most cost-effective appearance for Wang Xingxing in his ten years of entrepreneurship. Although his performance at the time was not particularly outstanding, Lei Jun, who sat at the main table, still noticed him. Years later, in July 2021, Lei Jun's Shunwei Capital led Yushu's Series A funding and continued to support in the subsequent Series B.

Sitting next to him, with a name just one character different, Wang Xing became the largest external industry shareholder of Yushu in February 2024.

The person who brought Wang Xingxing to Lei Jun and Wang Xing was Zhang Peng.

In September 2017, Yushu's Laikago was launched. The name was derived from the first dog to enter space, Laika. It was no longer the prototype from his graduate school days but Yushu's first commercial quadruped product intended for real customers: joints, power supply, control, and reliability all had to transition from demonstration effects to deliverable product capabilities.

It was also in this year that Zhang Peng saw Laikago from a cold public account article and a few pictures and short videos. Zhang Peng had previously taken Chinese entrepreneurs to MIT and seen the "robotic cheetah" in the lab: a cheetah's head atop a large body, filled with steel cables and flying wires. Thus, when he saw a Chinese team produce a smaller and more product-like robotic dog, his first reaction was shock.

【Summary (pure text, may be empty)】：

Wang Xingxing showcases the Laikago prototype, with holes even in the sole

Zhang Pengfei arrived in Hangzhou, at an inconspicuous building in Binjiang District, where there was no doorplate, indicating that this was not a standard office building, and it seemed there were factory premises nearby. "Upon entering, I couldn't see any workstations; it felt like a garage, filled with various parts and unfinished robotic dog components, along with two fully assembled robotic dogs."
Wang Xingxing demonstrated some actions to Zhang Peng, including some standard moves, like kicking, which the robot couldn't be knocked over by. After the demonstration, the two felt awkward as there was nowhere to sit. They ended up chatting on a sofa in the corridor outside the office for two to three hours.
"In 2017, Wang Xingxing felt like a freshly graduated student. He was a typical tech guy. But I sensed he had a natural talent for engineering, which you could quickly pick up on if you talked to him," Zhang Peng recalled.
Soon, Zhang Peng's Variable Capital became the first institutional investor in Yushu.
Zhang believed the company's reasonable financing needs at that time were about 15 to 20 million yuan, but Variable Capital's size was limited to only co-investing. The lead investor, who had initially agreed to the terms, fell through. At that time, Wang Xingxing's restructured quadruped robot Laikago was launched, requiring substantial funding. Within a year, Wang Xingxing had nearly exhausted the 2 million yuan from his initial investors, and at one point, he almost couldn't pay salaries.
To help Wang Xingxing, Zhang Peng decided to provide investment funds upfront. Zhang said, "We really didn't have time to hesitate. Because Wang Xingxing was out of money. If you hesitated for another month, his company might go under."
Wang Xing sat behind Wang Xingxing ==========
After getting through that period, in the second half of 2018, Laikago began shipping, selling hundreds of units globally. Financing also became slightly easier.
According to public business records and institutional disclosures, in 2018, Variable Capital entered Yushu through Jisi Investment; in 2019, Dexun Investment took a stake, and Ningbo Sequoia participated in the capital increase at the end of the year; in 2020, Sequoia continued to increase its investment, with Vertex and Chuxin Capital also coming in.
In 2021, Shunwei Capital led Yushu's Series A round; in 2022, the company completed its Series B round, with reports indicating that Jingwei Venture Capital and Dunhong Asset led the round, with Haikexiang, Shunwei, Rongyi, and Shenzhen Capital also participating.
The real flood of investment came in 2024. On January 31, a capital increase totaled about 600.34 million yuan, with Meituan's Hanhai Information, Jinshi Growth, Source Code Capital, Xinjiang Shenzhen Capital, and Zhongwang Investment entering at once. On August 31, another round of about 284.71 million yuan saw the Beijing Robotics Industry Development Fund and Zhongguancun Science City appear on the list, marking the first time state-owned capital became a direct shareholder of Yushu.
The entry of state-owned funds gave Yushu a clearer label as an "embodied intelligence industry asset."
That was the time when Wang Xingxing was at his peak.
After this substantial financing, Yushu Technology's robots appeared in the eighth program of the CCTV Spring Festival Gala directed by Zhang Yimou, where 16 H1 robots dressed in red floral coats danced the yangge, holding red handkerchiefs, changing formations, and turning the handkerchiefs at various angles. The discussions generated by this program reached a cumulative total of 3.2 billion views.
 > Yushu Technology at the 2025 Spring Festival Gala
Overnight, it became a sensation across the country. The next day, this robotics company and its founder entered the memories of every Chinese household.
This was not luck. Huang Jiawei from Yushu's marketing department stated clearly: "Actually, we had already appeared on the CCTV Spring Festival Gala in 2021 during the Year of the Ox. We maintained close contact with relevant staff at CCTV, and they had reached out to us about three to four months prior to this year's gala." Regarding the preparation for this Spring Festival Gala, the team mentioned several months of intense rehearsals, adjustments, and choreography.
The returns from the Spring Festival Gala also left traces in the financials. The prospectus disclosed that Yushu's domestic revenue share rose to 56.35% in 2025, with the company explicitly listing the increase in national recognition from the Spring Festival performance as one of the reasons; the total annual revenue was approximately 1.676 billion yuan, with humanoid robot revenue around 868 million yuan, and the shipment of pure humanoid robots exceeding 5,500 units in 2025.
 > Evolution of Yushu Technology's robotic dogs and robot models
At the private enterprise symposium in February 2025, a widely circulated photo from the scene showed 14 entrepreneurs seated in the front row. Ren Zhengfei was in the middle, Jack Ma was second from the left, and Lei Jun and Liang Wenfeng were also present.
 > Wang Xingxing speaking in the front row at the private enterprise symposium
Wang Xingxing sat in the front row, the only post-90s representative, and one of the six entrepreneurs who spoke. That day, Meituan's Wang Xing sat a few rows behind Wang Xingxing.
 > Wang Xing from Meituan
In the following one to two years, Yushu Technology advanced at an astonishing pace, with a year's development surpassing the previous four years combined.
On June 6, another round of financing totaled about 694.50 million yuan, with China Mobile and Chuang, Tencent Technology, Byte's Wuxi Jinqiu, Alibaba's Hangzhou Haoyue, and Shanghai Yunzhan joining in, with Tencent officially becoming a direct shareholder of Yushu. In September, Wang Xingxing was selected as one of the 100 most influential figures in the AI field by Time magazine for 2025. On November 15, Yushu completed its IPO guidance. The clock for the listing began to tick.
Wang Xingxing himself was also busy being pushed forward. In the past, he would explain early projects on Zhihu and Bilibili, occasionally showing gloves, dexterous hands, and robot prototypes to netizens; he once expressed in a video after participating in a commercial shoot for a client: "I earned half a year's salary in one day of shooting." That was still a moment when an engineer felt fresh about his first personal commercial income.
But now, Wang Xingxing's attire has changed from pullovers to shirts and suits, and his update frequency on social media like Zhihu has decreased; even when he does update, it is mostly product promotion, no longer sharing personal thoughts.
On New Year's Eve, February 16, 2026, Yushu appeared on the Spring Festival Gala for the third time. 25 robots performed alongside students from the Henan Tagou Martial Arts School, showcasing drunken boxing, double-staff tricks, and sword dancing. The G1 took on most of the high-difficulty group dances, while the larger H2 made a grand entrance as the "Sword Master," ultimately joining hands with the young martial artists to bow together. At 10 PM that night, JD.com listed several robots, including the "Spring Festival Gala version," which sold out within minutes.
A month later, on March 20, Yushu's application for the STAR Market was accepted; it passed the review on June 1, with only 73 days from acceptance to the review meeting. In July, Wang Xingxing and Yushu's manned mech GD01 appeared on the cover of Time magazine; on August 6, Yushu's STAR Market was priced at 150.80 yuan, with subscriptions starting on August 10. DeepSeek appeared on the strategic allocation list, receiving approximately 933,900 shares, worth about 140.76 million yuan, locked for 36 months. There was almost no time left for the outside world to reflect on the previous events.
Returning to Wuzhen ====
At the bustling Wuzhen Internet Conference in 2017, Wang Xingxing made his first public appearance.
Eight years later, Wang Xingxing returned to Wuzhen for another Internet Conference, which was clearly not as lively as before, but during that summit, there were 28 forums of various sizes, with the most audience attending the one where Wang Xingxing was present.
 > Wang Xingxing as a key guest at the 2025 Wuzhen Internet Conference
The organizers set up a special "Six Little Dragons Wuzhen Dialogue," hosted by Wang Jian, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and founder of Alibaba Cloud. On stage were Wang Xingxing from Yushu, Han Bicheng from Qiangnao Technology, Huang Xiaohuang from Qunhe Technology, Zhu Qiuguo from Yunsenchu Technology, Feng Ji from Game Science, and senior researcher Chen Deli from Deep Exploration.
Wang Xingxing, as the first speaker, expressed his deep feelings for Wuzhen, "From attending the summit as an audience member for the first time in 2017 to sitting on stage today to share my experiences."
When Wang Xingxing first came to Wuzhen, Yushu had just received personal angel investment, with a valuation of about 13.33 million.
Today, Yushu's STAR Market issuance price is 150.80 yuan, with a post-issue valuation of about 61 billion yuan. Meanwhile, on overseas OTC platforms, the pre-IPO quote for Yushu Technology was 590 yuan, corresponding to a market value of about 238.7 billion yuan, meaning that based on this market value, the profit from Yushu Technology's IPO could reach as high as 220,000.
In other words, Wang Xingxing's Yushu Technology has increased its market value by 17,900 times in nine years.
Looking back at that 2017 "Dongxing Bureau" group photo, one can sense a nearly cruel sense of time. At that time, the entrepreneurs and related internet companies at the table were often reported by the media to have a combined wealth of about 700 billion yuan, representing the total of an era of platform internet golden age.
Today, if calculated based on the market value of 238.7 billion, Wang Xingxing's 30.02% stake corresponds to about 71.7 billion yuan. In contrast, the total wealth of the entrepreneurs at the Dongxing Bureau table in 2017 was 700 billion. He alone has reached one-tenth of the total wealth at that table.
The Dongxing Bureau witnessed a moment when an old cycle reached its peak, while also leaving a small starting point for a new cycle outside the venue.

"Every generation of young people has its own opportunities." No one is more convincing in saying this than Wang Xing.

This content is provided for general informational purposes only and doesn't constitute financial, investment, legal, or tax advice. Any events, rewards, online promotions, or related information mentioned herein should not be considered a recommendation, solicitation, or invitation to purchase, sell, trade, or otherwise deal in any crypto assets. Crypto assets are highly volatile and may result in loss. The availability of WEEX services, products, and related events may vary by region. You are responsible for ensuring that your participation is in accordance with applicable local laws and regulations.