What happened in China Two threads converged in early 2026 that every European robotics distributor and industrial investor should be reading together. First: Unitree Robotics and Alibaba are reportedly preparing a strategic global expansion partnership via AliExpress, according to Pandaily. This is not a cold start — in 2025, Unitree already opened its official flagship store on AliExpress. The reported partnership would deepen that relationship into something more structurally significant: using Alibaba's global commerce infrastructure as the primary rail for international distribution of Unitree's robot lineup. Second: On March 20, 2026, the Shanghai Stock Exchange formally accepted Unitree's IPO application. A public listing does not just raise capital — it forces transparency, disciplines operations, and signals that a company is preparing to operate at a different scale. Unitree is also aiming to ship up to 20,000 humanoid robots in 2026. These are not hobbyist numbers. Meanwhile, on March 23,…