Editor’s Be aware: There is no such thing as a scarcity of know-how information, but many promising Chinese language startups nonetheless stay largely unknown to world audiences. On the similar time, the fixed stream of funding information, product launches, and new applied sciences makes it more durable to see which firms actually deserve consideration. DragonLab is TechNode’s effort to shut that hole, trying previous the noise to find China’s subsequent wave of innovation—rising firms, bold founders, and breakthrough applied sciences which have but to obtain world consideration.
The agricultural drone is not the onerous half. XAG is now attempting to automate the charging, refilling and floor work that also hold individuals within the loop.
What does an automatic farm seem like? A tractor transferring by way of a area and not using a driver? A drone spraying crops and not using a pilot? Or a system the place machines can end a job, recharge, refill and begin once more with little human intervention?
All three visions are starting to take form. Within the U.S., John Deere has introduced autonomy to tractors and precision spraying by way of merchandise comparable to its autonomous 8R tractor and camera-based See & Spray know-how. Texas-based Hylio has taken one other route, constructing autonomous agricultural drones and software program that lets one operator handle a number of plane.
China’s XAG overlaps with each approaches however is attempting to attach extra items of farm automation. Its portfolio spans agricultural drones, floor robots, autopilot methods for typical equipment and smart-farm infrastructure. Its latest merchandise push that technique one step additional: automating a few of the work that occurs when a drone is again on the bottom.
At XAG’s SuperX Farm in Guangzhou on July 6, founder Peng Bin used a cellular app to ship two X150 agricultural drones into the sphere. Extra notable was what occurred between flights. An XA1 drone station recharged the plane, whereas an LM1 system combined and refilled liquid for spraying. The method from charging and refilling to takeoff took about three minutes.
The setup types XAG’s new X Sequence agricultural robotic system, combining an X100 or X150 drone with a drone station and automatic liquid-handling tools to automate route planning, spraying, charging, refilling, and cleansing.
The more durable half begins when the drone lands. Charging, refilling, cleansing, and relaunching nonetheless require human arms. XAG’s newest system is designed to automate extra of that turnaround.
An extended pivot into agriculture
XAG started in Guangzhou in 2007 as XAircraft. Earlier than deciding on farming, the corporate experimented with power-line inspection, search and rescue, logistics and different drone purposes.
Its agricultural flip got here in 2013. Throughout a visit to cotton fields in Xinjiang, the group started contemplating whether or not drones may substitute labor-intensive pesticide spraying, co-founder Gong Jiaqin stated in a 2022 interview with TechNode. XAG first developed the enterprise in Xinjiang, expanded throughout China and started transferring abroad round 2017 and 2018.
Japan turned certainly one of its first main abroad markets. Gong advised TechNode that its fragmented farmland resembled China’s extra carefully than the massive farms frequent in nations such because the U.S., Australia and Brazil. An ageing rural inhabitants additionally created demand for smaller automated machines.
Internationalization was sluggish by design. {Hardware} needed to meet totally different certification necessities, whereas farmers usually wanted a number of planting seasons to determine whether or not new tools may genuinely enhance productiveness. Gong stated the corporate’s early years abroad had been due to this fact spent largely on product validation and native partnerships.
Capital adopted the growth. In 2020, XAG raised RMB 1.2 billion, or roughly $182 million on the time, in a spherical co-led by Baidu Capital and SoftBank Imaginative and prescient Fund II. GL Ventures invested one other RMB 300 million in 2021.
XAG withdrew its STAR Market utility in 2022, when the corporate was nonetheless loss-making and China’s capital markets had been below strain. An individual acquainted with XAG advised twenty first Century Enterprise Herald on the time that market circumstances had been the primary consideration behind the withdrawal.
When XAG returned to the general public markets with a Hong Kong itemizing utility a number of years later, its funds appeared markedly totally different. Income rose from RMB 614.5 million in 2023 to RMB 1.07 billion in 2024 and RMB 1.17 billion in 2025, whereas the corporate swung from a RMB 132.8 million loss to a RMB 123.8 million revenue over the identical interval.
The turnaround was pushed largely by rising abroad drone gross sales, greater gross margins and tighter expense ratios.
XAG later withdrew its utility for Shanghai’s STAR Market in 2022 and turned to Hong Kong. Its newest Hong Kong itemizing submitting exhibits income rising from RMB 614.5 million in 2023 to RMB 1.07 billion in 2024 and RMB 1.17 billion in 2025. Web revenue reached RMB 123.8 million in 2025.
From an autonomous drone to an autonomous workflow
XAG’s 2026 lineup extends past drones. It contains the P200, P150 Extremely and P120 agricultural drones, together with agricultural rovers, autopilot methods for typical equipment, sensible irrigation merchandise, and the brand new RM80 autonomous mower.
The X Sequence provides the clearest indication of the place the corporate needs to go subsequent.
The X100 carries a 50-liter liquid tank, whereas the X150 carries 85 liters. Relatively than requiring staff to deal with each turnaround manually, the drone can return to an XA1 station for charging, whereas the LM1 system prepares and replenishes spraying liquid. The system may also routinely clear the tank, pipelines, and nozzles after a job.
The RM80, launched on the similar July occasion, extends the automation push to the bottom. The electrical four-wheel-drive machine can plan routes, routinely return and carry out mowing and vegetation-clearing duties in orchards and fields.
In contrast with U.S. firms, XAG’s distinction lies partly within the breadth of the system it’s assembling.
Texas-based Hylio focuses on aerial utility, with software program that lets one operator handle a number of agricultural drones. John Deere approaches automation by way of farm equipment, utilizing autonomous tractors and camera-based See & Spray methods for focused weed management.
XAG sits someplace throughout these classes. It sells aerial spraying methods like Hylio, however has additionally developed floor robots, tractor autopilot and farm IoT merchandise. The X Sequence provides one other layer by automating charging and chemical dealing with across the drone itself.
That breadth, nonetheless, has not but translated into equally diversified income. Agricultural drones generated RMB 1.02 billion in 2025, or 87.6% of XAG’s income. Agricultural rovers and autopilot methods every contributed about 1.5%, whereas smart-farm IoT merchandise accounted for 3.1%.
Why automate extra of the farm?
Agriculture is a tough setting for robots. Climate and terrain change, whereas machines should take care of mud, water, chemical substances, bushes and different obstacles. A breakdown throughout a brief spraying or planting window can shortly turn out to be pricey.
But these constraints additionally strengthen the case for automation, significantly the place farm labor is scarce.
In 2022, Gong advised TechNode that agricultural know-how would solely turn out to be commercially significant when it may substitute a lot of the human work in a whole manufacturing step or ship a considerable effectivity acquire. 4 years later, the X Sequence partly displays that imaginative and prescient: past autonomous flight, it automates charging, mixing, and refilling, decreasing a few of the labor nonetheless required between missions.
The worldwide check
XAG now has to make that automation mannequin work throughout very totally different farming methods.
Based on newest Hong Kong itemizing submitting, its distributors cowl almost 70 nations and areas. Abroad income reached RMB 419 million in 2025, or 35.9% of whole income, up 13% from a yr earlier.
The corporate can be pushing additional into the U.S. In February, XAG launched the P150 Max on the Spray Drone Finish Consumer Convention in Kansas Metropolis, positioning it for spraying, spreading, mapping and on-farm logistics.
The U.S. is a helpful check for XAG, the place it competes with each farm-machinery incumbents and home drone makers. XAG enters the market with a portfolio spanning drones, smaller floor robots, and farm automation methods.
That makes XAG’s abroad growth a check not simply of its drones, however of its broader automation mannequin. The corporate has already constructed a large enterprise within the air. Its subsequent guess is on how a lot work could be taken off the bottom.
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