OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Confirms Plans to Develop Humanoid and Specialized Robots
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman confirmed on the Sources Podcast that the company will develop humanoid and specialized robots, prioritizing the AI "brain" over hardware form factors. OpenAI has established a dedicated robotics team that is currently hiring for electromechanical actuators, simulation workflows, and embodied AI data collection. This marks a major strategic shift as OpenAI enters physical AI hardware, directly competing with humanoid robotics efforts from companies like Tesla and Figure AI. By focusing initial deployments on industrial environments like data center maintenance before consumer homes, OpenAI aims to prove the value of its intelligence models in mission-critical infrastructure. Altman noted that while human-shaped designs fit a world built for human physical structure, OpenAI will also create non-humanoid robots for tasks where humanoid forms offer no operational advantage. Personal general-purpose assistant robots remain a long-term company goal, whereas industrial automation is the near-term priority.
## BACKGROUND
Embodied AI refers to artificial intelligence systems integrated into physical bodies capable of perceiving, reasoning about, and interacting directly with the physical world. Unlike software-only AI models, embodied AI requires hardware actuators (the mechanical components that control physical movement) combined with advanced neural network models acting as the controlling brain.