With more than half its revenue coming from overseas and a cornerstone investor deeply embedded in the U.S. defense tech ecosystem, the founder's attack on China's embodied AI infrastructure is seen as a diversion.
**A company with overseas revenue accounting for more than 50%, core markets in North America, Europe, Japan, and South Korea, brought in an overseas asset management giant as its largest cornerstone investor before listing.** Ten days after listing, its founder suddenly began to "blast" China's embodied intelligence industry's data infrastructure construction.
This timing, this identity, this motive—is it really just a coincidence?
## First, look at the data: Where does Mech-Mind's money actually come from?
Mech-Mind listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on September 1, 2026, under the title of "the first stock in embodied intelligence eyes, brains, and hands."
But opening the prospectus, one number stands out:
In 2025, overseas revenue accounted for 50.3%, exceeding domestic revenue for the first time. The gross margin of overseas business was 79.2%, far higher than the overall gross margin.
From 2023 to 2025, overseas revenue soared from 58.6 million to 196 million, with a compound annual growth rate of 82.7%.
Its products rank first in market share in both Japan and North America.
More than half of a company's revenue comes from overseas, its largest increment comes from North America, and then its founder "blasts" China's embodied intelligence infrastructure construction on Chinese social media.
You can interpret this picture yourself.
## Next, look at the shareholders: Who is behind Mech-Mind?
In Mech-Mind's listing, the lead investor was Scottish asset management giant Baillie Gifford, which subscribed a cumulative 186 million USD!
What is Baillie Gifford's background? It is a long-term shareholder of Tesla and one of the oldest active management funds in the world. Digging deeper into this fund, in August 2026, Hadrian completed a 1.37 billion USD Series D financing, with a post-investment valuation of 7.87 billion USD.
Baillie Gifford was a co-lead investor. **Hadrian is an American defense technology company focused on building AI-driven automated factories for the aerospace and defense sectors, and it explicitly takes "countering China's manufacturing advantage" as its core narrative.**
An overseas institution became the largest cornerstone investor of a "first unicorn in Xiong'an" listing in Hong Kong.
We must ask: Who exactly is Baillie Gifford?
## Baillie Gifford, core capital of American defense technology
Baillie Gifford did indeed hold a heavy position in Tesla. But this is only the tip of the iceberg of its investment map.
It is also core capital in American defense technology.
Hadrian, an American defense manufacturing startup, completed a 1.37 billion USD Series D financing in August 2026, with Baillie Gifford as co-lead investor. Hadrian's core business is providing automated manufacturing services to the Pentagon, Lockheed Martin, and other U.S. military and defense giants, with products covering high-priority defense projects such as ammunition and shipbuilding.
Its CEO publicly stated that the company's mission is to "revitalize the American industrial base and compete head to head with China's industrial base."
[Image: imgmu7yohc2xsc4]
(Image source: Hadrian company official website)
AeroVironment, an American drone manufacturer. Baillie Gifford holds approximately 4.2% to 6.92% of its shares
. The "Switchblade" drone produced by AeroVironment is called a "kamikaze drone" by outsiders—a loitering munition that carries a warhead and carries out precision strikes by crashing into a target. This type of drone has been used by the U.S. military in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2011, and was supplied in large quantities to Ukraine after 2022.
AeroVironment itself disclosed that the Switchblade system "has participated in hundreds of combat engagements over the past 13 years."
Anduril, an American defense technology company. Baillie Gifford holds shares in it. Peter Singlehurst, head of Baillie Gifford's private business, specifically discussed on a podcast the investment logic of "how Anduril becomes a 200 billion USD company."
Babcock International, a British defense company. Baillie Gifford holds shares in it. Activists pointed out that Babcock has a cooperative relationship with Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) on British military projects.
Since 2024, multiple pro-Palestinian cultural groups have continued to campaign to demand that the Edinburgh International Festival cut its sponsorship relationship with Baillie Gifford, on the grounds that the company "profits from genocide in Gaza." More than 700 artists signed an open letter, ultimately forcing the Edinburgh International Book Festival to terminate its 20-year sponsorship relationship with Baillie Gifford in May 2024.
This is the true face of Mech-Mind's largest cornerstone investor: **an overseas asset management giant deeply embedded in the American defense industrial ecosystem, investing in "kamikaze drones," and co-leading a defense technology company that "counter China's manufacturing."**
## Now look at the timing: Why now?
Mech-Mind listed on September 1. It broke issue price on the first day of listing, and its stock price has remained under pressure since then.
Cumulative losses over three years exceeded 1 billion, and the adjusted net loss in 2025 was still 109 million. **93% of core revenue comes from 3D vision guidance—essentially industrial automation components.**
The "brain" and "hands" depicted in Mech-Mind's capital story have "**not yet formed meaningful development**."
The founder of a company that broke issue price just after listing, whose core business is still traditional industrial vision, and whose embodied intelligence revenue has not yet taken shape, chose at a moment when the stock price is under pressure to "blast" leading enterprises currently undertaking the task of building the country's embodied intelligence data infrastructure.
This is not whistleblowing. This is diversion.
## Are data collection centers a "related-party transaction trick" or a national strategy?
Shao Tianlan's core accusation is: enterprises sell robots to data collection centers built by local governments, then buy the data back, and through related-party transactions "manufacture" book revenue.
But the "Embodied Intelligence Training Ground Research Report" released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology in August 2026 states in black and white:
Embodied intelligence training grounds are "key infrastructure." More than 70 have been built and put into use nationwide, 46 are under construction or planned, forming three major clusters in the Yangtze River Delta, Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, and the Pearl River Delta.
The National Development and Reform Commission explicitly requires "building a high-quality real-machine data collection system to crack the data thirst." The National Data Administration positions "high-quality datasets" as foundational and key resources.
This is a systematic layout at the national strategic level. Stigmatizing national-level infrastructure as a "related-party transaction trick"—who is one singing against?
## The real question
Mech-Mind's overseas revenue accounts for 50.3%, and its overseas gross margin is 79.2%. Its growth engine is in North America, Europe, Japan, and South Korea.
If China's embodied intelligence data infrastructure is slowed down by public opinion warfare, who is happiest?
It is those American companies that are rapidly extending large model capabilities into the physical world.
It is those competitors that do not need China to establish an independent embodied intelligence data system.
The founder of a company with more than half of its revenue overseas, whose largest cornerstone investor is the investor behind American defense technology, and whose main business ranks first in market share in North America, "blasts" China's embodied intelligence infrastructure construction on Chinese social media—is this really "exposing industry problems," or is it "stirring up节奏" for the interests of certain people?
Data infrastructure is the "data power plant" of embodied intelligence. If the power plant is built slowly, the entire industry will have a blackout.
Some people may be hoping that China stays in a blackout forever.