The year 2020, when the production of industrial robots has achieved considerable development, is also the eighth year that China has secured the position of the world’s largest industrial robot application market. China is a manufacturing country, industrial robots are the key support equipment for advanced manufacturing industry, China naturally has a large demand for industrial robots, the document of the National Development and Reform Commission pointed out that since 2013, China has become the world’s largest industrial robot application market.

A06B-6077-H106 But the density of industrial robots in China needs to be improved. According to the data in the 2020 World Robot Report released by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), the robot density of China’s manufacturing industry ranked 15th in the world in 2019, with 187 robots per 10,000 workers (the density is 187), far lower than the first ranked Singapore, but it has exceeded the world average: Singapore has a robot density of 918, compared to the world average of 113.

Industrial robots have the reputation of “the pearl in the crown of manufacturing”, the world’s first industrial robot was born in 1959, and China’s research and development of robots is relatively late, starting in the 1970s. In 1982, Jiang Xinsong, then the director of the Shenyang Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, led a research team to develop China’s first industrial robot, Jiang Xinsong is one of the first academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, known as the “father of Chinese robot”.

A06B-6077-H106 After more than half a century of development, how is China’s industrial robot industry currently developing? What shortcomings or bottlenecks exist, and how should we break through?

Application and manufacture of industrial robots

The application of industrial robots in China has been rapidly improved in the past few years, although in 2019, China’s industrial robot density compared with Singapore there is still a large gap, but in 2014, China’s industrial robot density is only 36, lower than the world average density.

The amount of industrial robots purchased (or installed) in China is quite large. According to the IFR report, the global sales volume of industrial robots in 2019 was 373,000 units, of which 140,500 units were sold to China, accounting for about 37.6% of global sales, and China’s purchase volume not only ranked first in the world, It is also higher than the combined total of Japan (49,900 units), the United States (33,300 units), South Korea (27,900 units), and Germany (20,500 units).

A06B-6077-H106 In China, the automotive, 3C, home appliances, metal processing and other industries are the earliest application of industrial robots, of which the number of industrial robots applied in the automotive and 3C fields can account for half of China’s industrial robot applications.

So how many of the industrial robots China buys are “made in China”? How is the market competitiveness of “Made in China” industrial robots?

Listed company Robot (300024.SZ), which is controlled by the Shenyang Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, provided some observation data in its prospectus for issuing shares to a specific object and listing on the GEM (registration draft) released in mid-January 2021: In the first half of 2019, in China’s industrial robot market, the market share of domestic independent brands was 36%, the market share of Switzerland’s ABB was 13%, the market share of Japan’s Yaskawa was 12%, the market share of Japan’s Fanuc was 16%, the market share of Germany’s Kuka was 13%, and the remaining 10% was other brands. Japan’s Ankawa, Fanuc, Germany’s Kuka and Switzerland’s ABB, known as the four families of industrial robots in the industry, are world-renowned industrial robot manufacturers.

Robot This listed company, founded in 2000, layout industrial robots, collaborative robots, mobile robots, special robots and service robots five series of more than 100 kinds of products, products exported to more than 40 countries and regions.

A06B-6077-H106 Robot companies to the Economic Observer reporter introduced that at present, China’s robot manufacturing has achieved a leap from following to running stage, a relatively large competitive disadvantage is that the development process of the enterprise is relatively short, the industry market application experience accumulation is not rich foreign enterprises, but also need to dig deep in the field of segmentation, accumulate experience. “The difficulty in expanding foreign customers is that foreign enterprises have low brand recognition of Chinese enterprises, and need a large number of industry performance as support.” In addition, for the company, international talents are also relatively short, and it takes some time to truly understand the needs of customers. In recent years, the problems encountered in China are mainly concentrated in the fierce competition in the market, there are high-end barriers on the top, and there are domestic soldiers, resulting in disorderly competition in the market.” Robot to the economic Observer reporter said. “Brand” and “service” are also two key words mentioned by Dai Jiapeng when talking about the competitiveness of China’s industrial robots with reporters from the Economic Observer. Dr. Dai Jiapeng graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, used to design automation equipment in the manufacturing development department of General Motors, joined Foxconn in 2004, led the group’s automated robot team until retirement, won the Joseph Engelberg Robot Award in 2016, worked in the industrial robot industry for many years, has a deep observation of the industry.

A06B-6077-H106 In Dai Jiapeng’s view, the evaluation of the competitiveness of industrial robots made in China, can not be an overview, to be divided into industrial fields, application scenarios, “If it is said that the traditional application field of automobiles, the competitiveness of industrial robots made in China is not enough, the reliability of brands and services need time to accumulate, but in the field of precision and sensitivity requirements, such as handling.” Industrial robots made in China are very competitive.” “The advantage of China’s industrial robots is that they are cost-effective, and the weak points are mainly in terms of accuracy, stability and service life. The main application field of domestic industrial robots is handling and loading and unloading, and foreign 6-axis or more industrial robots are generally used in high-end automobile manufacturing, 3C and other fields.” South China Intelligent Robot Innovation Research Institute Dr. Li Wenwei is introduced to the economic observer reporter.

Dai Jiapeng believes that price is certainly an important indicator to measure competitiveness, China has a characteristic, is easy to appear price disruptors, “price disruptors are not necessarily bad, it may promote the development of the industry, but its emergence for domestic and foreign manufacturers are a pressure.”

Technical content and the control of high-precision components are currently the challenges facing China’s industrial robots. The production chain of industrial robots can be roughly divided into upper, middle and downstream, and the upstream is the manufacturing of parts, especially the manufacturing of core parts such as retarders, controllers, and servo motors; The middle stream is the manufacturing of robot ontology, and the downstream is the system integration. On the basis of robot ontology, combined with the intelligent software developed, the production line is arranged to make the industrial robot really put into use.

Eston (002747.SZ), another leading enterprise of domestic industrial robots, introduced in the 2021 annual non-public A-share stock plan released in mid-January that the three core components of the reducer, servo system and controller are the core technical barriers of industrial robots, accounting for about 36%, 24% and 12% of the cost composition of industrial robots, respectively. The total accounts for more than 70%.

A06B-6077-H106 The robot company introduced to the Economic Observer reporter, in the entire industrial robot industry chain, the machine manufacturing gross profit margin is the lowest, the controller is the brain of the industrial robot, determines the survival of the inferior industrial robot, high technology content, gross profit margin is also the highest, the second highest gross profit margin is the servo system, the servo system includes servo motor and servo drive, the reducer is also very important. But the gross profit margin of domestic reducer is very low.

Eston introduced in the above non-public offering plan, at present, about 85% of the domestic reducer market, 70% of the servo system market and more than 80% of the controller market are occupied by foreign brands, and there are certain differences in the performance indicators of domestic core components and foreign brands. If it is not possible to break through the key technologies of high-precision reducer, high-sensitivity servo system and high-performance controller, it will not only erode the profit level of domestic industrial robot products, but also cannot fundamentally improve the performance and reliability level of domestic robots.

A06B-6077-H106 As early as the first year of the 13th Five-Year Plan, the robot industry development plan (2016-2020) issued by the National Development and Reform Commission pointed out that a big gap between China’s industrial robot industry and industrial developed countries is the lack of key links in the robot industry chain, parts of high-precision reducer, servo motor and controller are dependent on imports, in addition, Related enterprises “small, scattered, weak” problem is prominent, lack of industrial competitiveness.

At present, the above two gaps have not achieved effective improvement. According to the data of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the operating income of industrial robot manufacturing enterprises above designated size in China will be 53.17 billion yuan in 2020. The market value of the relatively famous industrial robot listed company robot is 18.6 billion yuan, and the market value of Eston is 26.1 billion yuan.