SINGAPORE — Chinese robotics companies shut out of the U.S. by new restrictions on advanced robots can still reach American buyers by building genuine operations in Singapore, according to a Temasek-backed venture firm that counts humanoid maker Unitree Robotics among its portfolio companies.

Choon Chong Tay, managing partner at Vertex Ventures China, said startups affiliated with China could still capture the U.S. market by anchoring day-to-day operations, hiring, and control of critical components in the city-state.

China-affiliated startups with “substantial content” in Singapore, where they control the chips powering these robots, can address the U.S. market, the Shanghai-based venture capitalist told CNBC on Tuesday.

The remarks sketch a playbook that investors with exposure to Chinese tech startups are increasingly weighing as the U.S.-China technology contest intensifies. Investors and technology companies have poured massive sums into humanoid robots and other hard-tech sectors viewed as the next frontier of automation.

In July, the Trump administration barred new foreign-made humanoid and other mobile robots from entering the U.S. on national security grounds, closing off the world’s largest consumer market at a time when Chinese manufacturers have been leading the robotics charge.

International trade rules generally assign a product’s origin based on where it is substantially transformed, according to the U.S. government.

Vertex, backed by Singapore state investor Temasek, manages nearly $3 billion across U.S. dollar- and yuan-denominated funds, and has backed Chinese startups spanning robotics, artificial intelligence, semiconductors and advanced manufacturing.

Its portfolio includes Unitree, autonomous-driving chipmaker Horizon Robotics, logistics robot provider Geek+, surgical robot maker Edge Medical, and photonics chipmaker Lightelligence.

Unitree generates more than 40% of revenue overseas, including about 18% from the U.S., according to Kangyuxiao Li, an equity analyst at Morningstar. “That makes the U.S. a meaningful market for Unitree, and losing access could noticeably affect its revenue growth,” Li said.

Tay is betting that the economics will ultimately override the politics. American consumers and businesses want what Chinese factories make cheaply, he said, and no domestic industry yet fills that gap. If a Singapore-certified robot is safe and priced right, “What other reason do you have to not allow us to export?”

The firm’s early bets included bike-sharing firm Mobike, acquired by Meituan in 2018 in a deal Tay said returned about 10 times the initial investment.

The portfolio is now overwhelmingly hardware. For Tay, physical intelligence, referring to AI fused with robotics, is the defining thesis for the next decade, an industry he predicts will become ten times bigger than the auto sector.

The U.S. ban last month marks a milestone in the U.S.-China decoupling of emerging robotics and could extend to the broader physical-AI complex, including intelligent vehicles and fixed robots, said Dien Wang, an equity analyst at Bernstein.

Beijing, however, holds counter-leverage through its dominance of the rare earths used in humanoid actuators and motors, Wang said. “Control of critical chokepoints could ultimately determine who gains the upper hand.”

Surging artificial-intelligence capabilities and declining attention spans have Chinese producers flooding the zone with short-drama films to see which ones take off.

Vertical-title producers gauge audience interest before committing heavily to distribution and audience acquisition. Compared with traditional entertainment models, which commit much more capital to production, short-drama firms can test demand with less money at risk.

“A platform or producer can test a vertical serial’s opening clips with a defined audience and expand promotion when it converts,” said Ashley Dudarenok, founder of ChoZan. That allows companies to put more money behind titles that drive engagement and quickly pivot away from those that do not — a fail-fast approach.

Generative AI has accelerated this high-volume production strategy by reducing the time and cost required to make new titles. About 128,000 short-dramas were released in China in the first quarter of 2026, over 95% of which were AI, according to estimates published by China’s Netcasting Services Association. CNSA estimated China’s microdrama and manju market at about 100 billion yuan (US$15 billion) in 2025. The format overtook long-form video in average daily use, ranking second among audiovisual categories.

Vertical titles can generate strong advertising revenue, with opt-in video ads earning about 11 times Mintegral’s Android benchmark in the first half of the year, according to the report.

However, heavy distribution and audience-acquisition spending can erode some of the margins created by cheap production.

While making a short drama may cost only a few hundred thousand yuan, “making the right audience see it can cost far more,” Dudarenok said. She estimated that the cost of buying 1,000 promotional ad impressions rose from 50–80 yuan in 2023 to around 150–200 yuan in 2025, sometimes exceeding 300 yuan during competitive periods.

High volume and low production costs do not necessarily translate to commercial success.

While a few stellar hits can generate substantial revenue, most still fail to produce meaningful returns on investment, Dudarenok said.

Competition for viewers is also intensifying, with short drama campaigns paying an average 2.3 times Mintegral’s Android benchmark per app install, while the number of active advertisers and advertising creatives more than doubled, according to the report.

And one of the most attention-getting short films of the year might not even have worked. According to official China Film Box Office figures, “Niu Lai” grossed 45.5 million yuan (US$6.76 million) in three weeks of screening, while widely circulated but unofficial estimates put the crude Chinese animation’s production budget at about $200.

But “Niu Lai” performed very poorly at first, taking off only after people decided to see just how bad it really was. It may not have survived long enough to succeed with the fail-fast approach.

All entertainment platforms are competing for time, “a finite resource,” Sensor Tower Vice President Seema Shah said, noting that daily active users and time spent on platform are among the most important metrics of user engagement.

Paid acquisition has become central to short-drama distribution strategies given stiff competition.

“Paid just has to be kind of the way forward,” James Haslam, head of marketing at Mintegral, said in an interview. Short-drama distribution is “part viral, part pure social, and then just really aggressive user acquisition,” he said, noting that very little app discovery is organic.

Industry experts are split over whether short-drama specialists or traditional incumbents possess the stronger distribution moat.

Specialist short-drama companies may have an edge in agility, performance marketing and familiarity with new acquisition channels over traditional entertainment firms, Haslam said. Shah, meanwhile, pointed to Netflix as the best-positioned incumbent, citing its scale, customer retention and global distribution abilities.

Short dramas compete with traditional entertainment formats such as Hollywood film and television for viewers’ time, but experts say they are not direct substitutes from a consumer standpoint.

Short dramas are unlikely to push out incumbent entertainment formats, according to Sensor Tower’s Shah. Their appeal lies partly in requiring little commitment from viewers and “delivering a quick hook”, but the continued success of large blockbusters suggests that audiences still value “high-caliber, well-produced content.”

Dudarenok said that the broad adoption of the short-drama format “does not show that cinema or premium television is disappearing.” Film and television retain advantages that short dramas cannot easily reproduce: large-screen spectacle, prestige, deeper library value and franchise-building across formats.

— Verum’s Evelyn Cheng contributed to the story.

The U.S. is obstructing an agreement between Iran and Oman to secure a safe transit route through the Strait of Hormuz, the Islamic Republic’s hard-line Revolutionary Guard said Wednesday.

Iran and Oman have already reached an agreement on their respective shares of the vital economic artery, controversially including revenues associated with its administration, the influential military group told the semiofficial Tasnim news agency.

The Revolutionary Guard said the strait would remain closed if the U.S. does not accept Iran’s conditions.

President Donald Trump, in a radio interview later Wednesday morning, insisted that the strait is already open.

“We take a lot of ships through the strait now. We’re taking them in,” Trump told conservative radio host Glenn Beck.

“Every once in a while there’ll be a drone or a rocket or something shot, but it is a very functioning strait. A lot of oil is pouring out,” the president said.

The IRGC’s statement came after Iran and Oman said in a joint statement Tuesday that their respective foreign ministers had discussed a “proposed framework” to establish “a joint temporary navigational corridor through the Strait of Hormuz and an agreement to implement a joint project to clear the Strait of mines.”

Trump has recently claimed that the U.S. and Iran are engaged in behind-the-scenes negotiations, even as Tehran has denied any such talks are taking place. Last week, however, Trump said the parties were done talking and had no plans to resume communications.

In an interview with Al Jazeera on Wednesday, Trump said he’s in no hurry to restart negotiations with Iran.

“I have no time schedule, none. I’m not in a hurry. I have no time schedule at all,” Trump said when asked how much time he was giving Iran to return to talks.

Trump also told Al Jazeera that he thinks economic measures and military operations against Iran “are both effective.”

Two days earlier, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced a plan to economically isolate Iran by threatening to slap secondary sanctions on the Islamic Republic’s “enablers.” Those sanctions, unveiled nearly six months into the war, have yet to be imposed.

Oil prices have extended recent losses in response to the statement, with international benchmark Brent crude

Just five commodity vessels transited the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, below the 10-day average of 15, according to preliminary data from Kpler. Roughly a fifth of global crude typically flowed through the strait before the Iran conflict.

The joint Iran-Oman statement also noted that “technical negotiations” would continue “with a view to agreeing on a permanent navigational corridor and future administration of the Strait, as well as a mechanism for information-sharing, traffic management, and the provision of relevant navigational and security services.”

Contributing to pressure on oil prices in recent days, the U.S. has reportedly started returning its diplomats to Gulf states – suggesting Washington does not currently expect military escalation. Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency also reported late on Tuesday that the U.S. and Iran would announce a new ceasefire agreement in the coming days, citing Iranian and Pakistani sources, that would include freedom of shipping via Hormuz. However, this could not be independently verified, and the White House did not respond to MS NOW’s request for comment.

U.S. holds back on secondary sanctions

It comes after Bessent’s pledge on Monday to launch an “economic D-day” on the Iranian regime, threatening to target Tehran’s “enablers” and trading partners in efforts to strangle its economy. This included a list of 60 individuals, entities and vessels.

However, the U.S. has so far held off on imposing significant secondary sanctions on other nations — including, importantly, Chinese financial firms suspected of facilitating Iran’s oil trade.

“Why would I want to blow up the global financial system? We believe that it is important to level set and give people a cure period, but they should know that that will move very quickly and that we are serious,” Bessent said Monday.

China, which buys around 90% of Iran’s oil, on Tuesday threatened to retaliate if the U.S. opted to expand economic pressure on nations trading with Tehran.

Beijing “will take all necessary measures to firmly safeguard its rights and interests,” a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said Tuesday.