As embodied AI is poised to take an increasingly central role in commercial spaces, many industries will face challenges. While focus has naturally been on the potential productivity benefits that this revolution will bring about, large scale robot deployment will challenge manufacturers, developers and customers. Capital intensity, fragmentation and monetization hurdles go beyond teething issues; if done wrong, these issues will exacerbate problems and slow adoption. Done right, this is an opportunity to bring tens of thousands of robots to market in record time.

The vision

In this context, Auki and GAIB are delighted to announce a partnership to explore the mass deployment of robots in retail environments.

We believe that retail presents a unique opportunity to scale robotics due to established logistics networks and the number of locations with identical needs. With even medium sized retail chains having thousands of locations, we unlock a distribution and support model that scales, not to dozens of robots per customer, but to thousands. We have explored this topic previously in our article “How to Sell 10-100x More Robots than Figure or Tesla: a Heterodox Approach to Robot Distribution” but there are two key considerations to add.

• The real world web: Many robotics companies are very strong on hardware, but struggle with software and creating robust architecture for further development. The fragmentation of operating systems and software complicates deployments. There is a clear need for an open, interoperable spatial layer for robotics that makes deployment easy and adoption fast. The Auki Network and Cactus have already demonstrated robot deployment from unboxing to fully functional in minutes.
• The economics of scale: most retailers are interested in leasing robots instead of purchasing them outright, and while the ROI on most retail robots is calculated in months rather than years, most smaller robot manufacturers cannot carry the cost. Producing robotics solutions is capital-intensive, demanding substantial investment in hardware, R&D, and specialized talent. This is exacerbated by funding being concentrated in select, predominately western players.

So the market is characterized on the one side by a large number of retail companies looking for a robotics solution that can scale and work with their logistics networks. And on the other side by a large number of robot manufacturers that can create the hardware but need software and financial support to deploy at scale.

The plan

This is where Auki and GAIB come in to address these two challenges.

Auki has created the real world web which allows AI, devices and robots to collaboratively browse physical spaces such as stores and warehouses. This robust and open architecture enables developers to create apps that build on this shared spatial awareness, such as Cactus, the spatial AI app for retail. Cactus is already being used by retailers with thousands of locations.

“We believe that retail is the most scalable environment. Maybe every house could use a robot, but every store definitely could. We know the economics work and how fast you get ROI. All our retail customers are interested in robotics but questions remain on the financial model for the hardware. This partnership with GAIB allows us to get started deploying robots in stores without commercial terms becoming a stumbling block.“
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- Nils from Auki

Auki has a unique opportunity to make robot deployment seamless by providing a device and manufacturer agnostic map that retailers can self-host. This not only means that retailers can control and own their data, it also makes a variety of robot manufacturers viable for any deployment. Rather than having to choose between siloed, walled-gardens, retailers can deploy robots safe in the knowledge that they are investing in a future-proof, open architecture that will continue to support their goals.

GAIB is the economic layer for AI and robotics infrastructure. GAIB brings these assets onchain, tokenizing GPUs and robots. Through this tokenization, GAIB aims to make the multi-billion dollar robotics and compute economy accessible to their community.

“We share Auki’s vision for robotics in retail. By partnering with Auki, Auki is able to offer robots under terms that make them attractive to retail customers as well as ensuring that robot manufacturers are able to keep innovating.

Our economic layer makes it possible for investors to support the deployment of robots at scale by turning them into investment opportunities through tokenization, letting them benefit from the ROI. As a very capital intensive endeavour, this is essential for the industry and we’re excited to make this critical piece of infrastructure happen.“
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- Ramon from GAIB

Together, Auki and GAIB will streamline the software challenge of mass deployment through the Auki Network and the capital challenge by making the robot hardware accessible to GAIB’s community.

The next steps

Auki and GAIB will be exploring opportunities to deploy robots in retail environments starting in 2026.

Over the coming months, we will share more detailed status updates on our progress including robot integrations, pilot programs and deployments.

The retail market presents a unique opportunity for mass robot deployment and distribution, and Auki and GAIB are uniquely placed to take advantage.

About GAIB

GAIB is the world’s first economic layer for AI infrastructure, transforming real-world AI assets—GPUs, robotics, and AI energy systems—into tradable, reward-bearing onchain instruments. By bridging decentralized finance (DeFi) liquidity with AI infrastructure assets, GAIB unlocks a trillion-dollar opportunity at the intersection of AI, Robotics, RWA & DeFi.

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About Auki

Auki is making the physical world accessible to AI by building the real world web: a way for robots and digital devices like smart glasses and phones to browse, navigate, and search physical locations.

70% of the world economy is still tied to physical locations and labor, so making the physical world accessible to AI represents a 3X increase in the TAM of AI in general. Auki's goal is to become the decentralized nervous system of AI in the physical world, providing collaborative spatial reasoning for the next 100bn devices on Earth and beyond.

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