The Power of Physical AI

For over 10 years – except during the Covid Pandemic – I have always started my business year by attending the CES show in Las Vegas. Even though I am not a big fan of this city, I decided to fly to the desert because CES always gives me a glimpse of what to expect in the coming year. And so it was this year.

When I met Jochen Hanebeck, CEO of Infineon, at CES 2026 he said “the show is about AI everywhere”. As his company now makes about 1.5 billion US-$ of annual revenue in the power business he didn’t just speak about the “data flow” but he also added “do not forget the power flow!”, and he is right.

We all know that server farms, which are needed for Virtual AI assistants like ChatGPT, Copilot or Gemini consume a lot of power, but at CES the topic was more on “Physical AI”, which means artificial intelligence systems embedded in or controlling physical entities such as robots, drones or autonomous vehicles. In short, Physical AI acts in the real world, while Virtual AI operates in the digital realm. Physical AI, in some applications also called “Edge AI”, is just at the beginning, but it will definitely need a lot of efficient power solutions.

For quite a while, Alex Lidow, CEO of EPC, has actively emphasized the importance of efficient power solutions for robots, but this had felt more of a kind of niche market for me. However, at CES 2026 I had a very impressive demonstration of where robot technology will be going. Hyundai Motor Company, who acquired Boston Dynamics recently, showed its humanoid robot dubbed “Atlas”, which is said to play a major role in the so-called software-defined factory (SDF). Humanoid robots will most likely have an exponential growth because they are so versatile. By 2028 Atlas is expected to perform high-precision sequencing activities, and by 2030 Atlas is promised to perform highly complex assembly tasks. Once some safety- and AI-related challenges are overcome, Atlas is scheduled to enter home applications like elderly care by about 2035.

After watching the video in my recent CES post on LinkedIn you will understand why I consider this a booming future market – especially when you consider that Atlas even did a somersault from a standing position. All these robots need power (and power control) stages for their actors (motors) as well as for their artificial intelligence functionalities. For me this simply means: There is something really big coming towards us.

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My Green Tip of the Month: Be more sustainable and avoid disposable cups, forks, knives, plates etc. by choosing reusable items. Having returned from the US to Europe I once again realized that it is so easy to avoid giant amounts of rubbish which – in the best case – still only get “thermally recycled” (the waste management term for “burned”).

Kind Regards,
Alfred