CES 2026 Preview: Nvidia may reshape physical AI, and robots from China, the United States and South Korea will

# Source: Wall Street Insights

By Ye Huiwen

**CES 2026 Highlights Strategic Divide Among Chip Giants**: NVIDIA Shifts Focus to Industrial AI and Robotics, While AMD and Intel Double Down on Upgrading the Traditional PC Market. The exhibition’s spotlight has shifted from consumer electronics to the industrialization race of disruptive hardware such as humanoid robots, AI-defined vehicles and rollable displays, with Chinese, U.S. and South Korean manufacturers engaging in fierce competition across all tracks.

The 2026 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) will be held in Las Vegas, USA, from January 4 to 9. CES has long been a key platform for tech companies to launch their annual new products, featuring items set to hit the market as well as concept-stage devices that may never go into mass production.

Strategies of chip giants will see a notable divergence at CES 2026, with NVIDIA’s focus clearly not on the traditional consumer-grade graphics card market.

**NVIDIA**: The much-anticipated RTX 50 Super series graphics cards (including the RTX 5080 SUPER, etc.) may face delayed launches due to the high price and supply shortage of GDDR7 memory. CEO Jensen Huang’s speech will center on **Physical AI**, pushing AI computing power to expand into robotics and industrial scenarios. NVIDIA is likely to shift its focus to high-margin products, such as the RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell equipped with 96GB of memory.

**AMD**: Adopts a steady upgrading strategy. On the desktop front, it is expected to launch the Ryzen 9000 series, with the flagship Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 featuring dual-chip 3D V-Cache and a 192MB L3 cache, targeting workstation users. For the mobile segment, AMD will release the Ryzen AI 400 series (codenamed Gorgon Point) to consolidate its position in the PC market.

**Intel**: Faces a crucial battle. The company will unveil the Intel Core Ultra Series 3 (codenamed Panther Lake), which is expected to include around 14 SKUs. The flagship model, Core Ultra X9 388H, comes with 16 cores and a maximum frequency of 5.1GHz. If it gains widespread support from OEMs, it will help alleviate market doubts about the execution capability of its advanced manufacturing processes.

## Embodied Intelligence Battlefield: Advancing Execution Capabilities Through the China-U.S.-South Korea "Three-Way Contest"

2026 is regarded as a pivotal year for humanoid robots to move from demos to real-world workstations, with the core focus on **cost reduction, efficiency improvement** and **real-world validation**.

**Chinese Camp (Cost Control & Mass Production)**: Unitree and Deep Robotics continue to lead in cost management. Unitree may showcase the mass-produced G1 model performing operations on factory assembly lines; Deep Robotics will present its full product lineup including the X2 and A2, as well as core components like dexterous hands.

**U.S. Camp (Technological Benchmark)**: Boston Dynamics’ fully electric Atlas robot will make its first public demonstration, directly competing with Tesla’s Optimus and showcasing its commercialization potential.

**South Korean Camp (Industrial Chain Integration)**: South Korea will display the **K-Humanoid** alliance, led by Samsung-invested Rainbow Robotics. Exhibits include the HMND 01 Alpha, a wheeled-chassis industrial humanoid robot standing 220 centimeters tall with a 15-kilogram payload, demonstrating South Korea’s ambition to integrate the entire industrial chain from components to complete machines.

## Edge AI & XR: Counterattack from the Android Ecosystem and "Lightweight" Breakthrough by Chinese Manufacturers

The XR market is in a digestion period following the launch of Apple Vision Pro, and CES 2026 will mark the starting point of the Android ecosystem’s counterattack.

**Samsung/Google Alliance**: Samsung will debut its Galaxy XR glasses, a CES Innovation Award winner equipped with the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2+ Gen 3 chip. Running on the Android XR system and deeply integrated with Gemini AI, the device aims to build an ecosystem that can compete with Apple’s.

**Chinese Manufacturers (Lightweight Approach)**: Alibaba and Rokid are leading the trend of **lightweight AI glasses**, avoiding direct competition with bulky headsets. Alibaba will showcase its Quark AI Glasses S1, powered by the Qianwen AI assistant; Rokid Glasses focus on practical scenarios such as real-time translation and AR navigation.

## Smart Home: Robot Vacuums Enter an Era of "Minor Innovation"

Robot vacuums have entered a phase of incremental innovation. Ecovacs (X11 Omni Cyclone) and Dreame are no longer solely pursuing parameter upgrades; instead, they are incorporating cyclonic separation structures, GaN fast charging and quadruped obstacle-climbing technology to evolve their devices into autonomous service agents.

## Automotive Industry: Leaping from "Software-Defined" to "AI-Defined", Escalating Chip Arms Race

The automotive industry is undergoing a profound technological architecture transformation, with the competitive landscape of intelligent driving chips becoming increasingly clear.

### Chip Arms Race

- **NVIDIA**: Dominates the L4-level high-end market with its Thor chip (boasting 2000 TOPS computing power).

- **Qualcomm**: While its AI computing power lags behind NVIDIA’s, Qualcomm has successfully penetrated the supply chains of Li Auto and Mercedes-Benz with its "cockpit-driving integration" architecture based on the Snapdragon Ride Elite platform.

- **Mobileye**: Maintains cost-performance advantages in the L2+ market with the EyeQ6 Lite, securing a strong foothold in high-volume mass-produced vehicle models.

### Vehicle Technology

Geely (Galaxy A7 equipped with Raytheon AI Hybrid 2.0, achieving a thermal efficiency of 47.26%) and Great Wall Motor (VLA full-scenario large model) demonstrate the leading advantages of Chinese automakers in architectural innovation. Overseas, BMW will showcase its iX3 based on the Neue Klasse architecture, integrated with Alexa+ technology.

## Hardware Form Factor Breakthroughs: Lenovo’s Rollable Displays and TV Makers’ AI Image Quality Battle

Faced with innovation ceilings in traditional hardware, manufacturers are exploring bold form factor breakthroughs.

**Lenovo**: Will showcase functional prototypes of the ThinkBook Plus Gen 7 Auto Twist (featuring an AI-driven auto-rotating screen) and the ThinkPad Rollable XD (a rollable-screen laptop), aiming to resolve the contradiction between large screens and portability.

**Display Technology**: TCL and Hisense continue to deepen their focus on Mini-LED. TCL launches SQD-MiniLED, while Hisense showcases RGB-Mini LED. Both brands highlight the dynamic image quality optimization capabilities of their AI image processors, seeking to tell new display stories driven by AI.

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