Ruoyu Technology raises over 100M yuan Pre-A to scale its Jiutian robot brain

The Shenzhen startup's Jiutian brain treats robots as data collectors first; smart refueling is its opening commercial scene.

Shenzhen-based robot-brain developer Ruoyu Technology has closed a Pre-A round of more than 100 million yuan, led by Sunway Communication with Jinmu Capital, Qindao Capital, Huanghai Capital and Zhongchuang Capital participating. The company says the funding will go toward upgrading its Ruoyu Jiutian robot brain and expanding ecosystem partnerships.

Founded in 2023, the startup has now raised several hundred million yuan in total. Its founder and CEO Sun Teng is a serial entrepreneur whose research focuses on multimedia computing; chairman Nie Liqiang directs the Information Department at Harbin Institute of Technology, Shenzhen, and chief scientist Zhang Min is a computer science professor there.

Ruoyu is building the Jiutian brain around a three-part system of intelligence, robot hardware and real-scene data. Instead of treating the robot as the end product, the company uses deployed robots as tools for collecting real-world data — aiming for an intelligence layer that can move across hardware platforms, robot bodies and scenes.

The startup's first commercial scene is smart refueling: an explosion-risk, continuous-outdoor, extreme-temperature environment where autonomous refueling robots operate. The company's argument is that harder scenes surface real problems at higher density, forcing the system to expose its bottlenecks and evolve faster.

Explosion-proof certification is reshaping the architecture itself, according to the company: from centralized high-compute designs toward a layered "lightweight body safety controller plus edge computing" structure that trims onboard compute, sensors and bandwidth. Robot brains are now a funding category in their own right — and the players are racing to prove a technical loop, not just a demo.