Automation left the engineering department. Origin and grid access decide it now.
In Q3 2026 the US began screening mobile robots and humanoids by country of production, the IFR confirmed that China installs most of the world's industrial robots, and capacity auctions showed the grid can't serve every new load on time. Your automation decision now runs through trade policy and the interconnection queue. None of this required insider access. It required reading an FCC order, a robotics census and a capacity auction in the same room.
Robotics rises 4→5: origin rules (FCC), record installation data (IFR) and public-market capital (Unitree) arrived in the same quarter. Energy holds at 5 as the constraint moves from price to grid access. AI, Health Evolution and Quantum hold.
The robot became a trade object. Washington screened the ones that move.
In Q2 the robotics story was output: Figure's humanoids helping BMW build 30,000 vehicles. In Q3 the story became jurisdiction. The United States started treating mobile robots like telecom equipment, and the global census showed where the volume actually lives.