Inside Mint Future Factory: the visit that set the template

On 27 May 2026, during his visit to China, President Aleksandar Vučić toured Mint Future Factory, the innovation centre of the Minth group in Zhejiang province. The visit produced the images that have defined Serbia's robot story since: humanoid machines performing the Moravac, a traditional Serbian round dance.

What was on show

Alongside the dancing humanoids, the tour included a flying-taxi prototype, a robot mixing and serving cocktails, and assembly and industrial demonstrations. Vučić said a similar facility would come to Serbia and that a cocktail-serving robot could be export-ready within a year — a claim worth flagging as a projection rather than a delivered product.

That will mean new jobs. I'm glad the robots played the Moravac. Robots will be at Expo greeting guests.

The 33 trainees

Vučić pointed to a group of young Serbs training at the facility — reported as 33 people — as evidence that the knowledge transfer had already started. In later statements the training cohort is described in larger numbers (hundreds in China, with a target of around 500 a year), so the 33 are best understood as an early on-site group rather than the full programme.

Showcase versus plan

An innovation-centre tour is a curated event, and it is fair to read the dancing robots as a demonstration rather than a production line. The substance to track is not the choreography but whether the same assembly capability lands in Serbia — where, at what volume, and on what timeline. Those specifics came from the finance ministry and e-government office in the days that followed, and we cover them separately.

Sources

• Novosti — Vučić u Kini obišao inovacioni centar kompanije Mint Future Factory