Around the Šabac plant: a park and a battery plant in Inđija, robot training in Kragujevac

Within two days of the humanoid-robot plant in Šabac opening on 29 August 2026, Serbia's robot programme gained three more projects in two towns. At the opening, plans for a €200 million robotics industrial park in Inđija were presented. On 31 August Chinese battery maker Jiangsu Reliance Energy Tech signed a €100.5 million framework agreement for a plant in Inđija, and Mihailo Jovanović, director of the Office for IT and e-Government, announced a robot-training centre in Kragujevac. Taken together, the announcements sketch a chain: assembly in Šabac, parts and batteries in Inđija, training and language in Kragujevac. Only the first link is working.

Three sites, three stages

• Šabac — assembly. Opened on 29 August: a €20 million first phase, about 200 workers, assembly and calibration of humanoid and four-legged robots. Status: operating.
• Inđija — parts, drones and batteries. A robotics industrial park with €200 million of planned investment, and a battery plant under a €100.5 million framework agreement. Status: plans and an agreement; work was announced for the end of September.
• Kragujevac — training and language. A centre for developing, testing and training robots, and a Serbian language model for them. Status: an announced intention, with no date or budget.

Inđija: where the parts are meant to be made

According to the figures released at the Šabac opening, a robotics industrial park is planned in Inđija with total investment of €200 million. Once the project is complete, its planned capacity is up to 20,000 humanoid robots and robot dogs a year, for markets across Europe and the world. Minth founder Qin Ronghua said the park would also produce drones and batteries and that work in Inđija would start at the end of September; the approvals still had to be obtained.

President Aleksandar Vučić drew the line between the two sites: Šabac is the start, and only the large factories in Inđija will make “all the parts”, on a different scale. He explained the location by labour — the park can draw workers from both Belgrade and Novi Sad. Inđija was already one of six cities on the June map of Chinese commitments; now it has a defined role. The 20,000 figure is a target for the finished project, with no year attached.

The battery plant: what was signed

• Who: Jiangsu Reliance Energy Tech, founded in 2021 in Changzhou. The company says it makes tabless cylindrical lithium-ion cells in 21700 and 46-series formats, with NCA and LFP chemistries, and lists drones and humanoid and logistics robots among their uses.
• What: a €100.5 million framework agreement for a plant in Inđija's technology zone, signed at the Palace of Serbia by Economy Minister Adrijana Mesarović, Inđija municipality president Marko Gašić and a Reliance co-founder, with President Vučić present. It will be the company's first factory outside China.
• For what: batteries for drones, humanoid robots, unmanned vehicles, advanced power tools and household appliances.
• Not announced: production capacity, the number of jobs and when production starts.

Vučić presented the deal as support for a domestic supply chain for robots, drones and batteries, one that reduces reliance on imported components. He also said one of Europe's largest drone factories should open in Serbia within six months. Two days earlier he had said the Reliance meeting was arranged at the invitation of Minth's president. No supply deal between Reliance and Minth or AGIBOT was announced.

Kragujevac: training and a Serbian language model

On 31 August Jovanović told TV Prva that the Office for IT and e-Government wants to set up a dedicated robot-training centre within the future Innovation District in Kragujevac. The idea is to combine the new hardware with what Serbia has built for digitalisation: science and technology parks, AI development platforms and the supercomputers in Kragujevac. One of the projects is a Serbian language model to run on the robots, so that they speak Serbian as well as other languages. He named agriculture, healthcare and industry as uses, and Expo 2027 in Belgrade as the place where the robots should show their skills.

Expo is also where Šabac robots are booked: at the opening, Finance Minister Siniša Mali said 80 of them would go to Expo 2027. The training idea itself is not new. In June Jovanović spoke of Serbian specialists training in China and of Expo robots speaking around 100 languages, as we reported then, and in late May Mali promised a robot-training centre by the end of 2026. Whether Kragujevac is that centre, and when it opens, was not said.

Why the battery plant matters most for buyers

For a company running humanoids or robot dogs, the assembly site matters less than how fast worn parts can be replaced, and batteries wear out with use. They are also awkward to move: under IATA rules, lithium-ion batteries shipped on their own may fly only on cargo aircraft, at no more than 30% state of charge. A battery source within trucking distance of EU customers would shorten exactly that part of the service chain. In February, Serbia's share of the project was described as mechanics, down to battery housings; a cell maker would go one level deeper.

The caveats are as large as the promise. A framework agreement is not a factory. Capacity, a production date and customers have not been announced. And cells are only part of a battery pack: pack assembly, battery-management electronics and testing decide how much of the value stays in Serbia.

What we'll watch

Whether work in Inđija starts at the end of September as announced; whether Reliance names capacity and a start of production; whether batteries from Inđija end up in robots from Šabac; and whether the Kragujevac centre gets a budget and an opening date.

Sources

• Tanjug — Vučić na otvaranju fabrike robota u Šapcu
• Kurir — Vučić najavio veliki park robotike u Inđiji
• B92 — Osamdeset robota ide na EXPO 2027
• RTS — Potpisan sporazum sa kineskom kompanijom o izgradnji fabrike baterija u Inđiji
• Danas — Potpisan okvirni sporazum o izgradnji fabrike baterija za dronove i robote u Inđiji
• Serbian Monitor — Vučić is meeting with Chinese investors today to discuss a drone factory in Inđija
• Nova Ekonomija — Mihailo Jovanović: Formiraćemo centar za treniranje robota u Kragujevcu
• Reliance — About us
• IATA — Lithium Batteries Fact Sheet