On the eve of the Chinese New Year, the Spring Festival Gala, one of the world’s most-watched television broadcasts, delivered more than just festive entertainment. It served as a high-definition manifesto of China’s “embodied AI” supremacy. International observers, from Reuters to El Pais, watched as humanoid robots from start-ups such as Unitree performed complex martial arts, backflips and synchronised dances. As Beijing-based tech analyst Poe Zhao noted, these humanoids represent the...