Robotics · 28 October 2026 · 4 min read
ANYbotics has started delivering a legged robot for explosive plants. The count is not public
The company said on 28 October that ANYmal X is shipping to operators including Equinor and DSM-Firmenich. It is built for places where a spark is a fire. The early-access trials began in 2023. The announcement does not say how many robots left the building today.
ANYbotics said on 28 October that it has started customer deliveries of ANYmal X, a four-legged inspection robot for oil, gas and chemical plants. The company names Equinor and DSM-Firmenich among the operators receiving it. Chief executive Péter Fankhauser said four years of work and more than ten patents went into a machine that can go where a spark is not allowed. ANYbotics calls it the first legged inspection robot built for explosive atmospheres. That is the company’s claim. The announcement does not say how many units shipped, or what a customer is paying.
The job it is sold for is a round a person would rather not walk. Thermal, visual and acoustic sensors, and an optional gas sensor, are meant to read pumps, compressors and valves. The company says the readings go into its Shift software and on, through an interface, into the plant’s maintenance system. It also says the robot climbs stairs of up to 45 degrees and does not need the building to be rebuilt around it. A specification is not a count of rounds completed after the sale.
The trials are older than the deliveries. Since 2023, BP, Equinor, Shell, PETRONAS, Petrobras, BASF and SLB have run the robot on hundreds of onshore and offshore missions in an early-access programme. Those were tests, with the companies in the loop. A test mission is how a machine gets changed. It is not the same thing as a robot that now belongs to the site and walks a shift without the vendor standing next to it.
One large number in the announcement belongs to a different installed base. The company’s revenue chief said more than 50 customers in power, metals and materials already use the inspection system for over 120,000 autonomous inspections a month. That is the existing ANYmal business. It is not a figure for explosive-atmosphere robots delivered on Wednesday. The new fact is that a certified legged machine is leaving for named hazardous sites. The missing fact is how many, and what they miss.