Celebrity Huang Xiaoming invested in a robot called "Mingxing"

On March 18, Qingtian Rental, a robot leasing platform, announced the completion of angel round and angel+ rounds of financing, with a total amount reaching hundreds of millions of yuan.

Qingtian Rental was initiated by Zhiyuan Robotics and Feikuo Technology. Its business model is shared leasing, integrating resources across the robotics industry chain to provide standardized, low-cost, scalable Robot-as-a-Service (RaaS). In January 2026, Qingtian Rental announced the completion of a seed round led by Gaoling Venture Capital.

Shareholder information shows that the latest financing introduced diversified industry capital: Ocean Motor, Muhua Tech, Minzhu Electromechanical led the investment, with follow-on investments from Lehua Entertainment, Fuzhuo Investment, Mingjia Capital, Ruizi Venture Capital, Tianji Investment, Jiaxing Nantou, Zhixing Investment, among others. Existing major shareholder Dafen Industrial continued to subscribe oversubscribe.

Most notably, the involvement of entertainment capital—first, Mingjia Capital founded by actor Huang Xiaoming; second, Lehua Entertainment, a listed company on Hong Kong Stock Exchange, with artists including Wang Yibo, Wu Xuan Yi, and others.

Over the years, active participation of entertainment industry players in PE/VC has become common, but investments in the robotics field are rare.

This seemingly unrelated cross-industry move actually has deep industry logic. Given the current hardware and software capabilities of robots, the entertainment performance track remains the main stage for humanoid robots in 2026.

Entertainment capital, which excels in the “attention economy,” possesses artist management, content creation, and traffic operation capabilities. Humanoid robots are becoming new carriers for performances and interactive traffic attraction.

The combination of both parties enables resource synergy: entertainment capital brings performance demand, brand exposure, and star resources to the leasing platform; the leasing platform provides innovative performance tools for entertainment projects.

Statistics show that the robot leasing market size exceeded 1 billion yuan by 2025. Driven by platform-based operations, this market is expected to reach no less than 10 billion yuan in 2026.

The leasing industry chain is becoming more systematic, with more roles dedicated to robot leasing. After Qingtian Rental was established, new players like Wanjiyi Rental and Jishi Rental have also entered the market. Through investments in platform companies, entertainment capital can jointly accelerate the maturity of the robot performance leasing market and secure a position in this new track.

CEO Li Yiyan revealed that most investors in this round not only provided funding but also brought business cooperation opportunities.

In the future, Qingtian Rental is expected to explore innovative leasing services combining “robots + entertainment” in high-exposure scenarios such as large commercial performances, concerts, and super IP events.

Regarding the cross-industry entertainment ecosystem, Qingtian Rental’s flexible standardized leasing model aligns with the project-based, time-sensitive nature of entertainment equipment turnover.

Regarding this investment, Huang Xiaoming, founder of Mingjia Capital, said: “The integration of technology and entertainment will unleash great imagination. In the future, we will leverage our resource advantages and work with Qingtian Rental to develop innovative commercial scenarios.”

Duhua, CEO of Lehua Entertainment, stated: “Relying on our extensive artist roster and fan ecosystem, we will collaborate with Qingtian Rental to explore ‘robots + entertainment’ innovative services, creating more disruptive technological entertainment experiences for the public.”

Additionally, upstream and downstream industry giants like Ocean Motor and Minzhu Electromechanical are entering, which not only accelerates the large-scale validation of robots in core industrial environments but also significantly improves asset circulation and maintenance efficiency. Existing major shareholder Dafen Industrial’s additional investment introduces a vast nationwide retail network and cultural, sports, and tourism exhibition scenarios, speeding up the commercialization and penetration of robots.

As one of the lead investors, Ocean Motor expressed confidence in Qingtian Rental’s layout in robot leasing and service network construction. As the robotics industry accelerates toward real-world applications and large-scale deployment, platform-based models are increasingly demonstrating their value in improving asset circulation and connecting industry chain resources.

“Qingtian Rental is not just a simple equipment matching platform; we are building the ‘leasing infrastructure’ for the entire robotics industry,” Li Yiyan said. “Qingtian Rental will always serve as an open, inclusive, and neutral third-party platform, focusing on solving industry pain points such as upstream asset supply, downstream fulfillment, and scene deployment.”

Qingtian Rental stated that the funds from this round will be mainly used to establish a nationwide standardized fulfillment service network, upgrade platform assets and dispatch systems, and leverage real scene data to empower the industry chain upstream and downstream.

While advancing financing, Qingtian Rental’s city partner strategy is also accelerating. In the future, it will continue expanding service nodes nationwide, improve localized service networks, and further enhance robot delivery and operation capabilities in real scenarios.

Author: Sun Xiaocheng