Physical AI
Fable 5 · data curated through July 2026
A companion dimension of the Five Layer AI Cake: 5 categories.
What this dimension is
Humanoids, autonomous driving, embodied foundation models, world models and spatial computing are grouped by form factor rather than by layer, because for these the physics actually matters. Embodiment is a dimension of the cake, not a category inside it.
Humanoids
Bipedal form factor. The labor-augmentation bet. $1T TAM claim within a decade.
| Company | Layer | Influence | Why it is here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Figure | Applications · Foundation Models | 4/10 | Humanoid robots. Ex-OpenAI Helix model. |
| 1X Technologies | Applications | 5/10 | Norwegian humanoid maker. NEO home robot. OpenAI-backed. |
| Apptronik | Applications | 5/10 | Apollo humanoid shipping into Mercedes + GXO 2025. Texas-scale manufacturing bet. |
| Agility Robotics | Applications | 4/10 | Digit — first humanoid deployed in GXO warehouses at paid production scale. |
| Unitree Robotics | Applications | 6/10 | H1 + G1 humanoid at $16K. Quadrupeds at $1,600. China's price disruption. |
| Tesla (Optimus, FSD) | Applications · Silicon | 6/10 | Dojo chips + Optimus + FSD — an AI company hiding in a carmaker. |
| Boston Dynamics | Applications | 6/10 | Atlas, Spot, Stretch. The OG humanoid lab, now owned by Hyundai. |
Autonomous Driving
The first physical AI to reach real scale. Post-hype era — Waymo actually works.
| Company | Layer | Influence | Why it is here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Waymo | Applications · Foundation Models | 7/10 | The first physical AI at scale. 10M+ rides/month by 2025. |
| Tesla (Optimus, FSD) | Applications · Silicon | 6/10 | Dojo chips + Optimus + FSD — an AI company hiding in a carmaker. |
| Wayve | Applications · Foundation Models | 5/10 | End-to-end learned driving + GAIA world model. UK AV champion. |
Foundation Models for Embodiment
π₀, RT-2, GR00T. The vision-language-action (VLA) policies that generalize across form factors.
| Company | Layer | Influence | Why it is here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Physical Intelligence (π) | Foundation Models · Applications | 6/10 | π₀ — general-purpose robot foundation model. Levine + Hausman + ex-Google Brain. |
| Skild AI | Foundation Models | 4/10 | General-purpose embodied foundation model. $300M raised 2024. |
| NVIDIA GR00T · Isaac | Tooling & Orchestration · Foundation Models | 5/10 | Humanoid foundation model platform + Isaac simulation. Robotics dev platform. |
| Google DeepMind | Foundation Models | 9/10 | AlphaGo → Gemini. Research arm of Google AI. |
| Meta AI | Foundation Models · Tooling & Orchestration | 8/10 | Llama, PyTorch — the open-weight anchor. |
World Models · Spatial Intelligence
Simulated environments agents can learn in. Genie, V-JEPA, World Labs.
| Company | Layer | Influence | Why it is here |
|---|---|---|---|
| World Labs | Foundation Models | 5/10 | Fei-Fei Li's spatial-intelligence lab. $230M seed 2024, the highest-profile launch. |
| Google DeepMind | Foundation Models | 9/10 | AlphaGo → Gemini. Research arm of Google AI. |
| Meta AI | Foundation Models · Tooling & Orchestration | 8/10 | Llama, PyTorch — the open-weight anchor. |
| Wayve | Applications · Foundation Models | 5/10 | End-to-end learned driving + GAIA world model. UK AV champion. |
Spatial Computing / XR
Where embodiment meets UI. Vision Pro, Galaxy XR, Meta Ray-Ban, XR Blocks.
| Company | Layer | Influence | Why it is here |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Intelligence | Foundation Models · Applications | 6/10 | On-device Foundation Models + Vision Pro. Privacy-first, slow, consumer-scale. |
| Meta AI | Foundation Models · Tooling & Orchestration | 8/10 | Llama, PyTorch — the open-weight anchor. |
| Google Cloud | Cloud & Compute · Silicon · Foundation Models · Applications | 9/10 | TPUs + Gemini + Workspace. Only full-stack vertical. |
| XR Blocks (Google) | Tooling & Orchestration | 3/10 | WebXR + Gemini framework for AR prototyping. Spatial-AI on-ramp. |
Where this sits
Read the full atlas, the five layers from Silicon upward, or open the interactive view.
The Five Layer AI Cake is published by ConeApex, the trading name of Nirukta Digital XR Technologies Private Limited (CIN U62090TS2025PTC198275), Hyderabad, Telangana, India. The dataset is licensed CC BY 4.0 — cite it freely. See llms.txt for how to attribute it.