Former ByteDance robotics team head Kong Tao has reportedly joined Xiaomi, where he now leads a team developing foundation models for robots. Several people familiar with the matter said Kong joined Xiaomi in 2025 and brought a number of former ByteDance colleagues with him.
Xiaomi’s robotics division is said to have about 200 employees, while the foundation-model team operates separately within the company’s robotics business. Xiaomi has already released its Xiaomi-Robotics-1 foundation model and is testing humanoid robots in manufacturing environments. [IT Home, in Chinese]