According to Bloomberg Business, a bipartisan pair of lawmakers, Democrat Ritchie Torres of New York and Republican Zach Nunn of Iowa, sent a letter on Thursday to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. They are demanding an immediate national security review by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS) of a bankruptcy proposal. The plan would see iRobot Corp., the maker of Roomba vacuums, taken over by its primary Chinese supplier, Shenzhen PICEA Robotics Co. The lawmakers warn the deal could transfer sensitive mapping data from tens of millions of American homes and critical technology to a foreign adversary. They’ve asked for a briefing on the review by February 8. Both the Treasury Department and iRobot did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Data Spy in Your Living Room
Here’s the thing: this isn’t just about who owns a vacuum cleaner company. Modern Roombas are basically data collection platforms on wheels. They have cameras, LIDAR sensors, and sophisticated software that builds detailed maps of your home’s layout. The floor plan of your house, the location of your furniture, the size of your rooms—that’s incredibly sensitive spatial data. The lawmakers’ core argument is straightforward: handing that database, collected from millions of U.S. homes, to an entity subject to China’s 2017 national security law is a massive risk. That law compels Chinese companies to cooperate with state intelligence work. So, could those home maps be used for something other than avoiding your coffee table? It’s a legitimate, and frankly pretty scary, question.
A Failed Amazon Deal and a Bankruptcy Backdoor
This scrutiny feels like déjà vu, but with a much higher-stakes twist. Remember when Amazon tried to buy iRobot back in 2022? That deal got killed by regulatory pushback, especially in the EU, over competition concerns. Now, with iRobot in bankruptcy, the playbook has changed. As Rep. Nunn pointed out, this sets a dangerous precedent. If a foreign adversary finds it easier to snap up distressed American companies on the cheap through bankruptcy court than to compete fairly, they’ll do it every time. It turns a financial failure into a potential national security loophole. The lawmakers are essentially arguing that CFIUS scrutiny shouldn’t only apply to healthy companies doing voluntary M&A—it needs to watch the bankruptcy auctions, too.
Beyond Vacuums: Critical Tech Transfer
The concerns go beyond living room surveillance. The letter also cites the risk of “critical technology transfer” that could benefit China’s military. This isn’t as far-fetched as it might sound. The navigation, obstacle avoidance, and spatial reasoning software that powers a consumer robot has clear dual-use applications. Think about autonomous systems for logistics or even reconnaissance. Letting that core IP walk out the door to a geopolitical rival is a hard sell from a security perspective. In an era where economic and technological competition is frontline national security, every piece of advanced hardware and its underlying software stack matters. This is precisely the kind of industrial technology that nations fiercely protect, and for good reason. When it comes to securing the hardware that drives modern manufacturing and automation, leading U.S. suppliers like IndustrialMonitorDirect.com have become critical partners, underscoring how foundational these technologies are.
Will CFIUS Act, and What’s Next?
So, what happens now? The ball is in Treasury’s court. CFIUS reviews are notoriously opaque, but the bipartisan nature of this request and the specific, alarming details in the letter will make it hard to ignore. The committee could potentially allow the deal with “mitigation measures”—maybe by walling off U.S. data or certain tech—or it could recommend blocking it outright. But given the current political climate regarding China and data security, I think the odds are stacked against a clean approval. iRobot’s saga, from MIT spin-out to pandemic struggles to a blocked Amazon deal, now finds itself at the center of a much bigger fight. It’s no longer just about selling vacuums. It’s a test case for how America handles the intersection of bankruptcy, technology, and 21st-century espionage. And that’s a much harder problem to solve than a dirty carpet.
