Thursday, 5 November, 2026
Robotics Roadblock: China Halts SoftBank’s $5.4B Acquisition of ABB Unit
By TechShots Studio
China has blocked SoftBank’s $5.4 billion purchase of Swiss engineering group ABB’s robotics division. Regulatory scrutiny from Beijing focused on foreign investment security and data privacy concerns, specifically preventing domestic robotics data and intellectual property from being transferred overseas to train international AI models. The veto delivers a major setback to SoftBank's ambitious physical AI expansion strategy.
Read full story at REUTERS