California regulators have moved to shut down a startup that stages fights between humans and robots. The California State Athletic Commission sent a cease-and-desist letter to Rek, which calls itself "the humanoid robot fighting league," after a September 18 match in which a human, Frankie LaPenna, fought a humanoid robot piloted by a human using a remote virtual-reality system.
The letter, posted by Rek CEO Cix Liv on X, called the fight "unsanctioned" and demanded that the company stop "holding, promoting or advertising any boxing or mixed martial arts contest match, or exhibition, involving any human" in California without commission approval. Liv responded with a brief celebratory post: "We made it boys."
Rek's next planned match, scheduled for Friday, will feature two robots with weapons fighting each other. That event would not involve a human opponent and may fall outside the commission's order, though the source does not say whether regulators have weighed in on that format.