California is trying to shut down robot vs. human cage matches

October 8, 2026 Jay Peters

The California State Athletic Commission sent a cease-and-desist letter to a startup that hosted a match between a human and a robot last month, as reported by The New York Times.

The fight, which took place on September 18th, pitted a human, Frankie LaPenna, against a humanoid robot owned by a tech startup, Rek, that was being piloted by a human using what the NYT described as a "remote virtual-reality system." Rek says it is the "the humanoid robot fighting league" on its website, and the robot appears to be one from EngineAI but with a Terminator-like head swapped on top.

You can watch a replay of the fight on YouTube:

The CEO of Rek …

Read the full story at The Verge.

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