[Edaily Reporter Shin Yeong-bin ] Gong Kyung-chul, founder and chairman of the board at ANGEL ROBOTICS Co., Ltd.(455900), is returning as CEO. Drawing on the technology accumulated through research on wearable robots and human movement, he will personally lead the expansion of the company’s physical artificial intelligence (AI) business.

ANGEL ROBOTICS Co., Ltd. announced on the 16th that it held a board meeting and appointed Gong Gyeong-cheol, Director of the Future Technology Institute, as its new CEO.

CEO Gong founded ANGEL ROBOTICS Co., Ltd. in 2017 and served as CEO until October 2024. During his tenure, he led the company’s listing on KOSDAQ. After the company transitioned to a professional management system, he served as Chairman of the Board and Director of the Future Technology Institute, overseeing mid- to long-term technology strategies and the development of next-generation physical AI platforms.

With this appointment, CEO Gong has resumed his role as CEO after approximately two years and will once again be responsible for both technology and management.

CEO Gong also spearheaded the development of “phact,” a high-performance robot actuator recently unveiled by ANGEL ROBOTICS Co., Ltd., and “phorce,” a robot control platform that utilizes it. The company is expanding the drive and control technologies it has secured in wearable robots to a variety of robotic applications.

The company is also strengthening its research in physical AI. In July, CEO Gong was appointed director of the “Joint Research Center for Human-Physical Intelligence,” jointly established by KAIST’s Human-Physical Intelligence Research Center and NVIDIA. He is leading the development of a “human motion foundation model” that learns from large-scale human motion data to understand and predict human movement.

ANGEL ROBOTICS Co., Ltd. plans to enhance its physical AI capabilities by combining human motion data accumulated from wearable robots and medical settings with AI. While continuing its existing wearable robot and overseas business operations, the company is expanding its business scope to include robot actuators, control platforms, and AI models.

CEO Gong has also been active as a researcher in the field of robot control. His research team won gold medals twice—in 2020 and 2024—at the “Cyathlon,” an international competition where participants use robotics technology to overcome physical disabilities. He currently serves as a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at KAIST and as Chair of the Robotics Technical Committee of the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC).

Former CEO Jo Nam-min, who led the company starting in October 2024, spearheaded the company’s expansion into the ASEAN market. The “Angellex M20” gait rehabilitation robot secured medical device certification in Thailand, Malaysia, and Vietnam, while the “Angelsuit H10” walking assistance robot obtained certification in Malaysia and Vietnam.

CEO Gong stated, “The competitive focus of the robotics industry is rapidly shifting from hardware to AI—specifically, physical AI that operates in the real world,” adding, “By combining AI with wearable robot technology and our understanding of human movement, we will leap forward to become ‘the physical AI company that understands people best.’”