Harmonic drive and cycloidal gear actuators
Michael Joseph · Founder, Iapyx Labs
Updated September 7, 2026
Chinese strain-wave (harmonic) reducer makers are taking share from Japanese incumbents on the back of humanoid demand, with Leaderdrive posting sharply higher 2025 revenue and profit. On the cycloidal side, Nabtesco is expanding RV-reducer capacity and has launched new compact precision gear lines explicitly aimed at cobot and humanoid joints. Note: the strongest sourcing I could retrieve dates to Dec 2025–Jun 2026, slightly outside a strict 60-day window.
Key findings
- Leaderdrive reported 2025 net profit more than doubling year on year to RMB 124.4 million and revenue up 47% to RMB 570.7 million, citing expansion in both industrial and humanoid robot markets.
- J.P. Morgan estimates Leaderdrive holds roughly 30-40% of China's harmonic reducer market; its domestic humanoid customers reportedly include Agibot and UBTech Robotics.
- Leaderdrive's own corporate timeline claims 2025 annual sales of more than 300,000 strain wave reducers across 21 product series.
- Nabtesco announced new products in its RVmini and Monocrank compact precision reduction gear series on 2 December 2025, citing demand growth from collaborative and humanoid robots, and showed them as reference items at iREX2025 (opened 3 December 2025).
- Nabtesco is reported to be doubling its RV-reducer production capacity by 2026 in anticipation of humanoid demand, and acquired Slovak cycloidal-reducer maker Spinea in 2023.
- Domestic Chinese producers' share of the harmonic-reducer market is reported to have moved from about 15% in 2022 to about 38% by Q1 2024 (secondary analysis, not a primary filing).