Korea’s listed robot sector grew 9.8% in the first half — and lost 134.3 billion won doing it

Thirty-six listed Korean robot companies posted combined first-half revenue of 1.2905 trillion won, up 9.8% from 1.1750 trillion won a year earlier, according to a tally of half-year filings published by Robot Newspaper on August 18, 2026. Combined operating losses widened 20.3% to 134.3 billion won from 111.6 billion won. Half-year net losses narrowed 59.4% to 92.4 billion won from 227.4 billion won. Now Robotics was excluded because it had not filed.

The two KOSPI-listed names, Doosan Robotics and Samick THK, grew revenue 44.3% to 176.0 billion won with a combined operating loss of 28.5 billion won. The KOSDAQ cohort grew 5.8% to 1.1145 trillion won, with operating losses up 49.2% to 105.8 billion won.

Growth is real, and it is expensive

The individual growth numbers are not marginal. Doosan Robotics revenue rose 236% to 32.9 billion won while posting a 26.4 billion won operating loss. Rainbow Robotics rose 105% to 21.3 billion won with a 3.5 billion won operating loss. Yujin Robot rose 313% to 13.2 billion won. Mirae Company rose 149% to 44.5 billion won and turned profitable. Cmes Robotics rose 102% to 9.5 billion won while losing 9.9 billion won at the operating line.

So the demand is arriving. What is not arriving is operating leverage: the sector is spending ahead of it, and the aggregate loss is widening even as revenue grows. Triple-digit percentage growth off a 10 to 30 billion won base is a statement about how small these businesses still are relative to their market capitalisations.

The profitable names sell parts

The two largest operating profits in the group belong to Koh Young Technology, at 24.4 billion won on 161.4 billion won of revenue, and SPG, at 8.4 billion won on 169.6 billion won. Koh Young sells inspection and measurement systems. SPG sells gearing and motors. Neither is a robot company in the sense the market prices robot companies.

That is the same shape the global market has taken. The money in physical AI right now is in the picks and shovels — gearboxes, actuators, vision, inspection — and Schaeffler’s formed strain wave gearbox announcement last week was a version of the same observation from the other side of the world. The platform companies are buying share with balance sheet, and the component companies are collecting the margin.

Why it matters

Korea has committed serious public capital to physical AI, and the sector’s equities have been priced on that commitment rather than on results. This tally is the first clean look at what the money bought in the first half: about 115 billion won of incremental revenue and about 23 billion won of incremental operating loss.

That is not a verdict. Capital-intensive hardware businesses do lose money on the way up, and the narrowing net loss suggests some of last year’s one-off damage is behind them. But it does set a testable bar for the second half, and with RideFlux now filing for a KOSDAQ listing, the next valuation will be set against these numbers rather than against the announcements.