Visitors interact with a humanoid robot at the 8th China International Import Expo (CIIE) on November 6, 2025. Photo: Chen Xia/GT

China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) vowed on Thursday to promote the healthy development of the embodied artificial intelligence (AI) industry by accelerating the formulation of industry standards and assessment systems, accelerating innovation, and building up relevant infrastructure.

"Speed and bubbles are long-existing problems to be controlled and balanced in the development of frontier industries, including the embodied AI industry," Li Chao, spokesperson of the NDRC, said at a press conference on Thursday in Beijing.

In recent years, driven by technological innovation and the unleashing of social demand, the scale of the embodied AI industry - represented by humanoid robotics - has witnessed leapfrogging development at an annual growth rate of more than 50 percent, Li said.

Embodied AI integrates AI into physical bodies such as robots to enable them to perceive, learn and interact with the environment including humans.

According to predictions by research institutions, the market size of the industry is likely to reach hundreds of billions of yuan by 2030. "At the same time, we also observe, currently, humanoid robots are not yet fully mature in terms of technological development routes, commercialization models, or application scenarios," the official said.

Now, China has more than 150 humanoid robot enterprises, and this number continues to grow. "However, we must strive to prevent risks such as highly repetitive products flocking to the market and the compression of research and development space," Li said.

Facing a situation where opportunities and challenges coexist, the key lies in rational guidance, he said, noting that the NDRC has carried out in-depth research to help strengthen policy guidance, accelerate technological breakthroughs and boost the application of results.

The NDRC will accelerate the formulation of industrial standards and evaluation systems, and set up a sound market access and exit mechanism for the embodied AI industry, in order to foster a fair competitive environment and ensure the sector's orderly development, Li said.

In addition, the authorities will continue to support enterprises, universities, and research institutes in tackling key technologies, including the coordination between "brains" and "cerebellums" for robots, computing power adaptation between cloud and edge devices, and data fusion between simulation and physical machines, the official said.

Furthermore, the commission will promote the development of infrastructure such as training and pilot-testing platforms, and push for the integration and open sharing of technological and industrial resources nationwide to accelerate the application of embodied intelligent agents in real-world scenarios, he said.