Forget the humanoid folding laundry in every living room. The real money in robotics, argues Teddy Haggerty, lies in packaging robots for the jobs businesses need done today. The founder and CEO of Robo Inc. made that case on Episode 262 of The Robot Report Podcast, published on September 18, 2026 under the fitting title “The picks-and-shovels strategy behind the robotics boom”.
The gold-rush metaphor fits. During the California rush, the steadiest fortunes went to the people selling tools, not to the prospectors. Haggerty wants to play the same role for robotics: less about building the one miracle machine, more about the infrastructure, integration and training that let ordinary organizations put existing robots to work.
A serial wave-rider
Haggerty has a habit of showing up early. His ventures span high school drones, crypto infrastructure and safety helmets before he landed in robotics. In the interview he explains how RoboStore grew from a distribution play into a robotics education and deployment platform, and why Plainview, N.Y.-based Robo Inc. is now pushing toward a more localized, solution-first model.
That shift became official on August 10, 2026, when RoboStore launched Robo Inc. as a U.S.-based robotics manufacturer and systems integrator. RoboStore is the primary U.S. distributor for Hangzhou-based Unitree Robotics, and the partnership has put more than 1,500 humanoid and quadruped robots into service across North America for about 4,500 customers. “Rather than more far-out promises, customers want solutions that can be deployed now, built around a specific job and supported over time,” Haggerty said at the launch.
What Robo Inc. actually sells
Instead of one robot for everything (the company’s own line is “One robot will not perform every job”), Robo Inc. offers packaged solutions for four sectors:
- GUARDIAN for healthcare: observation, engagement and secure workflow handoff
- CADET + PACE for education: hardware, curriculum, credentials and continuing access
- FORGE for security: patrol, inspection, evidence capture and human escalation
- ARX for hospitality: concierge, wayfinding, guest assistance and venue workflows
Deployments run through RoboLink, a unified control and data platform, and customers can take the robots on a monthly Robotics-as-a-Service subscription. The company says it works with 150+ universities and research institutions and a developer community of 4,000+ members.
The localization angle is central. Robo Inc. plans to pair global supply chains with U.S.-based engineering, software, integration, testing, service and support, in answer to growing trade restrictions and cybersecurity worries. A 66,000-square-foot production facility on Long Island, New York, is expected to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2027.
Also on the episode
The news segment covered SoftBank agreeing to acquire the Robotics and AI Institute, Agility’s Digit 5 humanoid with new legs, batteries and safety upgrades, Universal Robots launching its seventh-generation robot platform at IMTS, and InOrbit.AI releasing an OpenRobOps ISO 21423 reference implementation. It makes a neat contrast: flagship hardware grabs the headlines, while companies like Robo Inc. bet that the durable business is in making that hardware useful on Monday morning.
