- Aiper is using cordless products and retail channels to challenge the old pool robotics order.
- Fluidra gives Aiper access to professional pool channels that online brands cannot easily build alone.
- The alliance does not secure victory, but it raises the competitive level of the robotic pool cleaner market.
Aiper is trying to do more than sell cordless robotic pool cleaners. It is trying to use cordless products, retail channels, and Chinese hardware execution to challenge the old order built by Maytronics and the professional pool channel.
That ambition became clearer after its alliance with Fluidra. In December 2025, Fluidra completed the first-stage transaction and invested about $100 million for a 27 percent stake in Aiper. The deal also included a second-stage structure: if Aiper exceeds $370 million in revenue and reaches roughly a 15 percent EBITDA margin, Fluidra may increase its ownership to a majority stake.
This is not only a financial investment. It is an industrial alliance. Aiper gains capital, professional channels, and access to a pool service ecosystem. Fluidra gains a faster-moving cordless robotic pool cleaner brand.
Why Aiper matters
When Wang Yang focused Yuanding Intelligent’s resources on robotic pool cleaners in 2019, pool cleaning in Europe and North America was still a slow business. Cables stayed in the water. Products moved through professional dealers. Users relied on pool stores and maintenance providers.
Aiper chose a different path. It made robotic pool cleaners look more like consumer electronics: cordless, easy to use, online-friendly, and suitable for large retail channels. This mattered because the old pool equipment channel was not the only way to reach consumers anymore.
The target was never just to make another pool cleaner. The target was to compete for leadership in the next generation of the category, when cordless products, online retail, and Chinese supply chains began to reshape the rules.
Fluidra gives Aiper what online brands lack
Aiper needs a partner like Fluidra because the pool industry is not a simple online hardware market. Selling on Amazon is only one part of the business. Robotic pool cleaners still require channel trust, after-sales support, warranty handling, and relationships with professionals who influence pool owners.
Fluidra has that foundation. In 2025, Fluidra generated about $2.54 billion (RMB 17.21 billion) in revenue and about $584 million (RMB 3.95 billion) in adjusted EBITDA. Its products cover pumps, filters, heaters, sanitization, covers, IoT, cleaning accessories, robotics, and commercial pool solutions. Pool and wellness accounted for nearly all of its business.
The most important part is demand structure. Fluidra describes the pool market as roughly 30 percent new residential pools, 60 percent residential maintenance, repair, and renovation, and 10 percent commercial pools. In other words, its core business is not only selling a device once. It sits inside a recurring maintenance network.
That is the part Aiper could not easily build alone. If Aiper wants to move from a fast-growing online brand to a durable global pool robotics company, it needs access to professional trust nodes.
Aiper gives Fluidra speed
Fluidra also needs Aiper. Cordless robotic pool cleaners are closer to consumer electronics than traditional pool equipment. Users compare prices online, watch videos, read reviews, and buy through large retail channels. This market rewards speed, product simplicity, and consumer branding.
Aiper has already shown those capabilities. Fluidra disclosed that Aiper generated about $195 million in 2024 revenue, up 75 percent year over year. Based on that growth rate, Aiper’s 2023 revenue was roughly $111 million. Aiper says it now covers more than 57 countries and regions, more than 10,000 retail stores, and over 3 million global users.
The company has also expanded its product scope from floor cleaning to walls, waterlines, and surface cleaning. That is important because robotic pool cleaning is not only about moving along the pool floor. The next stage is to reduce the full maintenance burden for pool owners.
The deal also shows caution
Fluidra did not immediately take control. It started with 27 percent. Its annual report recorded the initial investment cost at about EUR 85.4 million, with goodwill of about EUR 74.4 million. That means the value of the deal is not in Aiper’s book assets. It is in growth, brand, channels, and technology capability.
This cautious structure makes sense. Aiper is growing quickly, but the category is still difficult. Robotic pool cleaners are seasonal, high-ticket, waterproof, battery-powered, and service-sensitive products. A product failure can damage brand trust quickly.
Aiper has already faced safety recalls. The U.S. CPSC announced recalls related to Aiper Elite Pro GS100 in 2023 and Aiper Seagull Pro in 2025, citing risks involving battery overheating, short circuits, melting, smoke, or fire. Wang Yang has said the company chose to recall products even when the failure rate was low, and that later generations improved the technical process.
That response matters, but the lesson is clear: pool robotics is not a category where low price and fast launch cycles are enough. Water, batteries, sun exposure, heat, and long-term use all test engineering discipline.
The window is narrowing
Aiper is not alone. Beatbot is pushing the premium segment with financing and high-end products. WYBOT is moving from manufacturing depth toward brand and capital markets. Dreame, Roborock, Ecovacs, Segway Navimow, and Mammotion all have reasons to look at backyard robotics.
For Aiper, the next year is important. It needs to convert early shipment leadership into channel trust, service capability, and recognized category leadership before larger robotics companies allocate more serious resources to pool cleaning.
Fluidra gives Aiper a bigger ticket into the professional pool world. But it does not secure the final outcome. The competition in robotic pool cleaners may not happen only through products. It may also happen through equity, channel partnerships, supply-chain alliances, and acquisitions.
Aiper’s ambition is clear. The question is whether it can move from a fast-growing cordless brand to one of the companies that defines the next global pool robotics order.
Figures cited above are based on Fluidra materials, Aiper public information, CPSC recall notices, and Denny’s industry notes. RMB conversions use a June 8, 2026 reference rate of USD 1 to CNY 6.7656 for readability.