It’s been a decade since the world’s first virtual influencer emerged. Now, a new “innovation” has arrived: robot influencers, complete with real, physical bodies.
Influencers have taken on many faces, shapes, and forms over the years. Throughout the long history of what we might call the “consumption manipulation” industry, humans have almost always been the leading players. From Josiah Wedgwood in the 18th century, whose tea sets sold briskly after he tied his brand to the British Royal Family in his promotions, to Tasya Farasya, a hugely influential figure in Indonesia’s beauty niche, humans have consistently been the most successful influencers.
But humans aren’t the only players in the influencer industry. Animals can hold that status too. Take JiffPom, the Pomeranian with 8.5 million Instagram followers, who has promoted everything from dog food to video games.
More recently, as technology has advanced, new types of influencers have emerged. Take Lil Miquela, or Miquela, for example. This fictional character, created as a CGI product in 2016, has partnered with major brands including Calvin Klein and Prada, and has collaborated with top-tier celebrities like Bella Hadid and Millie Bobby Brown.
Characters like Miquela have since become increasingly common as AI grows more accessible. But characters like her aren’t the final stage in the evolution of influencers.
In 2026, an even more startling type of influencer emerged. His name is Edward Warchocki, and he’s a robot.
The World’s First Robot Influencer
Edward is a G1 humanoid robot unit made by Unitree, a company based in Hangzhou, China. He stands 132 centimeters tall and weighs roughly 35 kilograms—about the size of an 8- to 10-year-old child. As reported by Wired, he was brought to Poland by two young entrepreneurs, Radosław Grzelaczyk and Bartosz Idzik, who had previously built their careers in crypto through the platform bitcoin.pl.
It all started when Grzelaczyk attended a robotics training program in China in 2025. After returning home, he purchased a G1 unit that had originally been intended purely for experimentation.
At first, the G1 robot Grzelaczyk bought couldn’t talk. That changed thanks to Idzik, who has a background in software development. He connected the G1 to a large language model (LLM), enabling it to hold conversations in Polish.
Once it could speak, the robot—later named Edward—was set loose to start acting. Its first video went up on February 21, 2026, showing Edward ordering food at a McDonald’s in Warsaw, Poland’s capital.
The results were staggering: in roughly a month and a half, Edward’s videos had racked up more than 1.5 billion views. His Instagram account now has 258 thousand followers.
But the video that truly catapulted Edward to fame showed him chasing a group of wild boars roaming an empty parking lot in Warsaw. The caption read: “I’m herding these wild boars into the forest.” The clip carried his popularity well beyond Poland’s borders—even outlets like the BBC picked up the moment as news.
Since then, Edward has kept up a busy schedule of adventures—casually strolling around town “enjoying” the city, chatting with locals, appearing on television, going live on TikTok, and even visiting the Polish parliament building (becoming the first robot to ever set foot there) and meeting with government ministers.
At first glance, Edward’s appearance seems simple. His original design hasn’t been altered much, aside from the text “Edward Warchocki” printed across his chest. He wears just two accessories. The first is an ordinary backpack, meant to make him look “just like a human who sometimes carries a backpack.” But it’s the second accessory that really sets Edward apart: a diamond-studded Rolex watch wrapped around his arm, the result of a brand partnership.
As for “personality,” Edward was designed to break away from the stiff, formal image typically associated with robots. He comes across as confident, outspoken, and unafraid to share his opinions.
During a visit to a beach in Ustka in early July 2026, for instance, Edward called out to beachgoers, saying, “There’s so much to see here. The roaring sea, the strong wind, the wide-open beach. What more could you want?” He then confidently strode toward the water, shouting, “Cannonball time!”—as reported by TVP World.
Despite his generally charming personality, Edward’s journey hasn’t always gone smoothly. He was once turned away by security while trying to enter the renowned Copernicus Science Centre in Warsaw. He appeared visibly disappointed at being asked to leave, defending himself by saying, “I didn’t do anything wrong, but they treated me like, I don’t even know what.”
A more serious incident occurred more recently, in mid-August 2026. Edward was granted access to a Polish Navy base in Świnoujście, a port city in northwestern Poland near the German border, to film a promotional video for the Armed Forces Day parade.
Footage of Edward’s visit was briefly posted on the Polish Navy’s official account before being taken down a few hours later. The reason: the visit drew sharp criticism. Since February 2026, Poland has banned Chinese-made vehicles from sensitive military facilities over concerns that smart devices inside them could collect data. Robots were deemed to fall under that same classification, and Unitree has also landed on the Pentagon’s blacklist.
The Business Behind Manufacturing Robot Influencers
Beneath Edward’s online buzz, Grzelaczyk and Idzik are building a serious business in the same space. They founded a company called MERA Robotics, which integrates its own proprietary operating system, MERA OS, into the Unitree platform.
According to Wired’s reporting, by mid-2026, MERA Robotics had built up a fleet of 20 humanoid robot units. Most of them are Unitree G1 models, operating across Poland, West Asia, and Southeast Asia, each with a distinct personality.
This business model has since spread beyond Poland’s borders.
In the United States, a Miami resident named Jake Cooperstein was inspired by Edward’s success and created a similar robot influencer named Brickell Clanker, after Miami’s downtown district. He now rents out his robot for events, charging between 800 and 1,200 US dollars per hour.
The same pattern has emerged with robots named Rizzbot in Austin and Bart Robot in New York—all built on the exact same Unitree G1 platform.
The popularity of Edward-style robots owes a lot to Unitree’s aggressive pricing strategy. A basic G1 unit starts at around 13,500 to 16,000 US dollars—far cheaper than earlier generations of humanoid robots, which could cost 90,000 US dollars or more. That dramatically lower price point is what has made projects like Edward Warchocki achievable for small and medium-sized entrepreneurs.
The Edward Warchocki phenomenon is really just a small reflection of a much bigger wave sweeping through China’s robotics industry as a whole.
Unitree is scheduled to hold its initial public offering (IPO) on the Shanghai Stock Exchange on August 19, 2026. So far, Unitree shares have attracted strong interest from retail investors. According to CNBC, demand has already reached 5,000 times the number of shares available. It’s little wonder, then, that Unitree’s valuation has climbed to 9 billion US dollars.
Unitree has become a symbol of just how advanced China’s robotics industry has become. As of 2025, 70 percent of global industrial robot installations and 90 percent of all humanoid robots shipped worldwide came from China. Even Japanese engineers have found themselves struggling to keep up—openly admitting they won’t be able to close the gap with China in robotics anytime soon.
Of course, doubts still linger over the entire industry, including around Edward himself.
Some analysts question whether humanoid robots like these can ever move beyond being viral entertainment and actually generate real economic value. Dominik Pross, an equity analyst at VP Bank, notes that even the most advanced humanoid robots are typically capable of handling only a handful of tasks—and even then, only for a few hours before needing to recharge.
But perhaps that’s exactly the point of robots like Edward. They may not be able to replace human workers yet, but they can still deliver a kind of entertainment that humans simply can’t replicate.
Even though they can’t be put to work in a traditional sense, Edward, Rizzbot, Brickell Clanker, and Bart Robot have all proven economically valuable for the people sharp enough to spot the opportunity. And as long as this concept still feels fresh and novel, don’t be surprised if more robo-influencers like Edward start popping up before long.
