On May 28, humanoid robots took the runway alongside human models at Galaxy Corporation's Mach33: Physical AI Fashion Show, staged at Galaxy Robot Park in Seoul's Gangdong District — the first time a South Korean entertainment company deployed full-scale humanoid robots in a commercial fashion context built explicitly around the question of human-robot coexistence. The robots were made by Unitree Robotics, a Hangzhou-based Chinese company that disclosed funding from People's Liberation Army-connected programs in its 2026 Shanghai IPO filings and is the subject of active legislative action in the United States Congress.
Galaxy Corporation's Cultural Strategy: Fashion as Normalization Tool
Galaxy Corporation, the Seoul-based entertainment firm that manages K-pop star G-Dragon, SHINee member Taemin, and actor Song Kang-ho, staged Mach33 as a deliberate philosophical argument rather than a promotional event. Each human model walked paired with a humanoid robot in a matching outfit — a tasselled blue Texan-style ensemble complete with a robot-sized cowboy hat, a retro silver puffer jacket, billowing space-age trousers, and silky dresses fitted to the machines' skeletal frames. "We realised that robots, too, need to wear clothes," CEO Choi Yong-ho told reporters. "Just as every human being is unique, we believe that every single robot should also be distinct."
Choi has framed the venture as the opening ceremony of a "physical AI" era — a moment when artificial intelligence moves from screens into bodies that walk, gesture, and share space with people. The show's title refers to Mach 33, the approximate velocity required to escape Earth's gravity, which Choi uses as a symbol for humanity's desire to break technological limits. The event was staged inside Galaxy Robot Park, a 16,500-square-meter venue in Gangdong District that opened for public events on May 15 and is scheduled for its official grand opening in August 2026. Galaxy Corporation plans to host more than 1,000 robot performances annually before that formal launch.
The cultural logic is precise. Galaxy Corporation is betting that the same tools that launched K-pop stars globally — spectacle, aesthetics, emotional resonance — can normalize robots in public life more effectively than engineering demonstrations can. A mid-show mechanical glitch required one of the Unitree robots to be removed from the park's May 15 opening performance, a moment that several observers noted underscored the gap between the cultural aspiration and the engineering reality.
Industry analysts are divided on whether the strategy will hold long-term. Music critic and industry analyst Cha Woo-jin told the Guardian the real test will not be whether robots can hit their marks onstage but whether audiences will care when there is no human performer behind the performance. "That will determine if this is a genuine cultural shift or just a novelty show," Cha said. Professor Kim Jeong-seob of Sungshin Women's University told the Straits Times that prior experiments with AI-generated K-pop content failed to achieve mass popularity because music consumption is not driven by visual novelty alone. "The issue is whether AI technology can accurately convey the subtleties of human emotions. I think this is a challenge that remains unresolved by technology," he said.
What Galaxy Robot Park Actually Does: Beyond the Runway
Galaxy Robot Park is not exclusively a fashion venue. The 4.1-acre facility hosts humanoid robots performing K-pop choreography, mock boxing matches, interactive portrait-drawing, and a robot-valet parking service. Galaxy Corporation is targeting IPO listings on South Korean exchanges and has also discussed potential listings in the United States. The company plans to launch a world tour for its robot performers in 2027 and has announced plans to develop a dedicated robot fashion label as an extension of the Mach33 concept.
Once choreography or movement data is programmed into one Unitree robot, the same algorithm can be shared instantly with all others — a scalability advantage CEO Choi has noted gives robot performers a structural edge over human artists who must tour sequentially. "While we humans have to tour sequentially to places like South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong and Macau when going on a world tour, the advantage of robots is that they can simultaneously hold robot concerts in South Korea, Japan and China," he said.
What Are Humanoid Robots Capable of Today?
The robots at the Mach33 show were Unitree G1 and H1 humanoids, which carry between 23 and 43 degrees of freedom and can walk at up to 2 meters per second. For structured entertainment environments — a runway with a defined path, synchronized choreography — their capabilities are well-matched to the task. In unstructured environments, the picture is different.
Victor Mayoral-Vilches, founder of robotics cybersecurity firm Alias Robotics, has argued that Unitree's robots should only be operated via WiFi with Bluetooth disabled — a constraint that limits real-world deployment flexibility. The manipulation capabilities of the Unitree G1 in variable conditions remain, in the assessment of independent reviewers at the Silicon Valley Robotics Center, the machine's "honest weak point" — adequate for structured research workflows but requiring significant additional engineering integration for tasks that combine locomotion and grasping simultaneously. On benchmark shipment counts, Unitree's reported figures and independent market estimates diverge: Unitree cited output above 5,500 units for 2025, while third-party research firm Omdia counted approximately 4,200 delivered units — a discrepancy the firm attributed to definitional differences in how "shipped" versus "delivered" robots are tallied.
Ecosystem Friction International Users Face
For organizations outside China evaluating Unitree hardware, several real costs are not visible in the headline purchase price. The default software development kit has documented gaps around arm-and-locomotion coordination: tasks requiring the robot to manipulate objects while walking demand additional engineering integration work beyond what the standard kit provides. Documentation and technical support are primarily oriented toward Chinese-language users, and the developer portal, while expanding, lags the depth of Western-native robotics platforms. Reseller backlogs for the G1 stretched several months through early 2026, creating secondary market premiums on top of the base price, which starts at approximately $16,000 for the standard model.
US Congress Flags Unitree: The Security Record
Read more: Unitree Unveils First Robot App Store: Could This Be Start of the Killer App for Humanoid Robots?
The security history of Unitree's hardware is specific and documented. In March 2025, security researchers disclosed CVE-2025-2894, a backdoor vulnerability formally cataloged by the National Vulnerability Database confirming that Unitree's Go1 robot contained an undocumented remote access channel — the CloudSail service — that allowed the manufacturer, and anyone with the correct API key, complete remote control of the device without the owner's knowledge or consent. The CVE listing classifies the issue under CWE-912: Hidden Functionality.
In September 2025, a second vulnerability was disclosed: the UniPwn exploit, affecting the G1 and H1 humanoids used at Galaxy Robot Park. The flaw in Unitree's Bluetooth Low Energy WiFi configuration interface allows an attacker to gain root-level access wirelessly. According to IEEE Spectrum, a robot infected through the exploit can propagate to other Unitree robots within range, creating a network of compromised machines. Separately, security researchers documented that the Unitree G1 transmits data to servers in China every five minutes during normal operation. Unitree posted a statement in September 2025 acknowledging the vulnerabilities and saying it had begun addressing them. The company did not address its state data-sharing obligations in that statement.
The US legislative response has been bipartisan and specific. In May 2025, every member of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party signed a letter urging the Defense, Commerce, and FCC leadership to act against Unitree, citing confirmed PLA connections and Unitree robots operating inside US prisons, police departments, and Army operations. In March 2026, the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection held a hearing specifically on Unitree's national security risks, with witnesses from Scale AI and Boston Dynamics testifying in favor of export controls and potential market bans. Senators Tom Cotton and Chuck Schumer jointly introduced the American Security Robotics Act in March 2026, which would bar federal agencies from buying ground-based robotic systems tied to foreign adversaries including China. In May 2026, Senator Rick Scott introduced the Blocking CCP Spy Tech Act of 2026, which names Unitree specifically and requires a national security investigation as a precondition for any continued US market access.
Unitree filed for a $610 million IPO on Shanghai's STAR Market in March 2026. Its prospectus disclosed that the company received funding from programs connected to the People's Liberation Army and acknowledged it could be subject to US export controls.
China's National Intelligence Law: What It Requires of Unitree
The most structurally significant consideration is not a vulnerability that can be patched. China's National Intelligence Law of 2017, Article 7, requires that "all organizations and citizens shall support, assist, and cooperate with national intelligence efforts." This obligation applies to Unitree Robotics regardless of where its robots are deployed, where its servers are located, or what its privacy policy states. The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Department of Homeland Security have both confirmed that this law gives the Chinese government the legal authority to compel Chinese companies to hand over data on demand — an obligation that, per DHS, applies even when the equipment has left China's borders. Unitree has not publicly addressed how it manages this legal requirement in relation to non-Chinese customers.
Decision Framework for Anyone Evaluating Unitree Robots
Galaxy Corporation has answered the question "how can humans and robots coexist?" with a fashion show. The question organizations and consumers evaluating Unitree hardware must answer is different: whether the performance advantages, the cultural appeal, and a price point far below comparable Western platforms outweigh confirmed security vulnerabilities, a legally mandated state data-sharing obligation, active US bipartisan legislative action, and ecosystem friction that adds real engineering cost not visible in the purchase price.
The answer will differ by context. A research laboratory with no sensitive data running experiments in an air-gapped network faces a different risk profile than a healthcare facility, a government contractor, or a public entertainment venue where robots are internet-connected and in close proximity to visitors. Galaxy Corporation's larger bet — that humanoid robots dressed in fashion-designed outfits, walking alongside human performers, can shift public perception at the cultural level — is a genuine and original strategy for a genuine problem: the public's residual discomfort with machines that move like people. What the Mach33 runway cannot resolve, and does not attempt to, is the legal and technical infrastructure beneath the spectacle. The fashion fits the machines. The policy and security framework for managing what those machines do with the data they collect has not yet caught up.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is physical AI, and how is it different from software AI?
Physical AI refers to artificial intelligence embedded in robots and machines that occupy the physical world — walking, manipulating objects, and interacting with people in real environments — rather than existing solely as software on a screen or server. The term distinguishes embodied robots from chatbots and large language models. Galaxy Corporation CEO Choi Yong-ho used it to describe a new era in which AI is no longer confined to digital interfaces but shares space with people in homes, offices, and entertainment venues.
How can humans and robots coexist safely?
Robotics researchers and security experts, including Victor Mayoral-Vilches of Alias Robotics, have argued that safe coexistence requires robots to be secure before they can be physically safe — a robot that can be remotely hijacked poses risks that go beyond its mechanical capabilities. Independent research has found that Unitree robots transmit operational data to servers in China during normal use, creating surveillance concerns in sensitive environments. Physical safety protocols, including minimum operating distances and emergency stop systems, are standard in Unitree's deployment guidelines for the G1 and H1 models.
Are the Unitree robots at Galaxy Robot Park connected to the internet?
Galaxy Corporation has not publicly disclosed the network configuration of its Unitree robots at Galaxy Robot Park. Unitree's G1 and H1 humanoids are designed for WiFi connectivity and have been documented transmitting telemetry data to servers in China during normal operation. Security researchers who disclosed the UniPwn exploit in September 2025 found that Unitree robots with active Bluetooth can be remotely compromised by attackers within range, and recommended disabling Bluetooth connectivity as a mitigation.
What is Galaxy Robot Park, and when does it fully open?
Galaxy Robot Park is a 16,500-square-meter entertainment venue in Seoul's Gangdong District operated by Galaxy Corporation. It opened for public events on May 15, 2026, and its official grand opening is scheduled for August 2026. The park features humanoid robots performing K-pop choreography, mock boxing matches, interactive portrait-drawing, and robot valet services, with plans to host more than 1,000 robot performances annually.
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