Agility Robotics heads to Wall Street in a $2.5 billion bet on staffing warehouses with humanoids

A maker of humanlike robots that carry totes around warehouses is going public on Wall Street in a test of whether there’s a market for putting AI-powered humanoid machines to work.

Agility Robotics, based in Salem, Oregon, announced Wednesday a planned merger with an investment firm that will value the company at $2.5 billion as it becomes the first publicly traded company entirely devoted to building and selling humanoids.

Its competitors include Tesla, whose CEO Elon Musk has pitched its humanoid prototype Optimus as the future of the carmaker.