EQT Group partners with 1X to enable deployment of 10,000 robots.

EQT Group has agreed a strategic collaboration with robotics start-up 1X to make as many as 10,000 humanoid robots available to companies across its global portfolio. The plan is positioned as a controlled commercial ramp—pilots beginning in the United States in 2026 with a staged expansion across Europe and Asia through 2030—giving portfolio operators early access to general-purpose humanoid automation.

The proposal targets practical, human‑adjacent roles rather than speculative consumer applications. EQT and 1X intend the effort to focus on logistics, warehousing, facility operations, manufacturing and healthcare—domains where labour shortages, seasonal peaks and repetitive tasks create clear value for assistive robots. EQT has roughly 300+ portfolio companies and the partnership explicitly leaves final adoption choices to each management team.

1X will supply production capacity and integration expertise around its NEO humanoid platform, while EQT contributes operational reach and rollout capability through its private capital and early-stage arm, EQT Ventures. Bernt Øivind Børnich, Founder and CEO of 1X, said the arrangement is designed to couple the vendor's manufacturing pipeline with hands-on enterprise pilots. Ted Persson, the partner who led EQT Ventures' initial investment in 1X, framed the tie-up as an opportunity to help portfolio companies navigate workforce change while lifting productivity and safety metrics.

From a market perspective the move is notable because humanoid robotics remains at an early commercial inflection point. Industrial robot deployments already run into the hundreds of thousands of units annually, but general‑purpose humanoids—built to work closely with people and across multiple tasks—are a nascent segment. Analysts forecast double‑digit CAGR for service and collaborative robots over the coming decade as labour scarcity, automation economics and AI advances converge.

Economically, the announcement signals a model private capital investors may increasingly use: partnering with specialised hardware and AI vendors to pilot frontier technology across a diversified portfolio. If even a fraction of the proposed 10,000 units are adopted, it would materially accelerate commercial validation for humanoid platforms and create scalable reference installations for both vendors and investors.