At present, the market for industrial robots develops rapidly, accounting for about 1/3 of the global market share, and is the world's largest market for industrial robots. Industrial robots account for 67% of the overall robot market, which is higher than the international level of 63%. In addition, in recent years, a series of policy documents such as "Robotic Industry Development Plan 2016-2020" have been successively issued, clearly proposing major breakthroughs in key parts and high-end products for robots, realizing the quality and reliability of robots, market share, and the leading enterprises Requirements for promotion. China's robotic industry has rapidly expanded in size and has maintained a growth rate of over 20% in the past five years. From January to July this year, it produced a total of 71,600 industrial robots, an increase of 57% year-on-year.
Market status: Big cake was cut away by foreign companies
The Chinese industrial robot market has developed rapidly, accounting for about 1/3 of the global market share, and is the world's largest market for industrial robots. Industrial robots account for 67% of the overall robot market, which is higher than the international level of 63%. In addition, in recent years, a series of policy documents such as "Robotic Industry Development Plan 2016-2020" have been successively issued, clearly proposing major breakthroughs in key parts and high-end products for robots, realizing the quality and reliability of robots, market share, and the leading enterprises Requirements for promotion. China's robotic industry has rapidly expanded in size and has maintained a growth rate of over 20% in the past five years. From January to July this year, it produced a total of 71,600 industrial robots, an increase of 57% year-on-year.
But the other side of faster growth is the starting line that has fallen behind. At present, the density of industrial robots in China (the number of industrial robots used per 10,000 workers) is low. At present, there are only 40 industrial robots owned by 10,000 workers in the manufacturing industry in China. Although these two years have improved, but only half of the international average, less than 15% of developed countries. According to the "Robotic Industry Development Plan (2016-2020)", the density of industrial robots will reach 150 or more by 2020, but it is only one third of the density of current industrial robots in Korea. In addition, Li Yizhong stated that China's industrial robot industry has developed rapidly, but there has always been a problem that the industry's core competitiveness is not strong. The level of technology is not high enough, and the self-owned brand rate is low, accounting for only 30%. Domestic industrial robots are mostly three-axis to five-axis, six-axis and higher-end robots, 85% are foreign brands, and smart applications are only just starting. In response, Zhu Miandi, vice president of the China Federation of Machinery Industry and chief engineer of the former Ministry of Machinery Industry, also expressed his concern: “If you do not grasp the market now, after several years, it will be harder to recapture the robot industry. Space is smaller."
As domestic robots currently have large gaps in accuracy, longevity and reliability, they have affected the enthusiasm of domestic companies in using domestic industrial robots. Indeed, from the practical use of some smart workshops that some exhibitors have visited and reporters have visited, the four major families are still popular.
“We will go to participate in the identification of some robots every year, but I have some guilty consciences.” Zhang Xianmin, Dean of School of Instrument and Automobile Engineering at South China University of Technology, said that in the initial stage of identification, the sports indicators of domestic robots partially exceeded foreign ones, but after a period of use, The stability and reliability performance of domestically-relevant equipment movements is far lower than that of similar equipment in developed countries. This is the current short-board.
In response to these situations, participating experts also issued "prescriptions."
Li Yizhong stated that while encouraging domestic enterprises to use domestically produced robots, enterprises are encouraged to quickly acquire foreign advanced technologies through mergers and acquisitions, equity participation, and strategic cooperation. For example, Midea Group has invested in a 94.55% stake in German KUKA.
Zhu Sendi believes that domestic robots should find a gap in the market competition with foreign capital, gradually infiltrating from traditional areas to the areas of electronic information and auto industry that are currently occupied by foreign capital. "Now many traditional manufacturing areas have poor working conditions, relatively high labor intensity, and poor job quality. However, these areas are exactly the areas that the four major families have not paid attention to, such as the polishing of bathrooms, furniture, and castings."
At the summit, a textile and apparel smart IoT equipment manufacturing integrator told reporters that the solution he currently offers to customers has been using a Swiss company's robotic arm, but they are considering switching to domestic production this year because of the cost performance ratio. high.
It can be seen that domestic robots have made progress. According to the latest data from the China Robotics Industry Alliance, sales of domestic multi-joint robots accelerated in 2016, with sales exceeding 10,000 units for the first time, at 11756 units, an increase of 92.7% year-on-year. The growth rate has exceeded 70% for two consecutive years. Accounted for 40.4% of the total sales volume of domestic industrial robots, up from the previous year
Next stop: Human-robot collaboration
At the summit, "human-machine collaboration" continued to be a hot topic of discussion. Zhu Si first used "human-machine collaboration" as a stage in the evolution of domestic robots from industrial robots to intelligent robots.
Although there are many robots in the assembly line and welding line in many factories, the task can be completed completely without human intervention, and the degree of automation is very high. However, in reality, this is only a robot's repetitive work based on a pre-implanted program. It is not intelligent.
Currently, the robot's online perception capability is far lower than that of humans, and it is difficult to receive abstract commands and it is difficult to communicate effectively with people. Therefore, in many industrial scenes, it is more difficult to rely on industrial robots for full-automatic production. For example, it is difficult for aircraft assembly to be carried out on the assembly line as in the case of automobile assembly, including aircraft, ships, aerospace, etc., mainly relying on labor. In addition, many manual work robots in labor-intensive manufacturing industries are still not competent.
Hao Yucheng, deputy secretary-general of the China Robotics Industry Alliance, told reporters that "collaboration" is actually a more general concept and that people and machines can now alternate work. In other words, the machine can sense that people are approaching and stop working, and when people complete the work and leave the sensing distance, they can resume work autonomously. People can't do work with machines for the time being. To achieve human-machine collaboration requires a variety of technologies, including artificial intelligence and sensors. Collaborative robots fill the gap between fully automated production lines and fully manual assembly lines. As early as 2015, ABB, UOne, and others have already launched several human-robot collaboration robots. Collaborative robots are relatively lightweight and their space requirements are significantly reduced, which can reduce the cost of many installations or plant buildings for companies.
Hao Yucheng pointed out that in the “human-machine collaboration” production, safety is an important issue, so conventional robots are relatively closed.
In general, after a complete risk safety assessment, the collaborative robot can work close to the employee without guardrails. Take a collaboration robot of FANUC in Japan as an example. It has two modes of high-speed work and collaborative work that can be switched at any time. Within a safe distance, people will automatically switch to safe mode when they touch, and the repeatability can reach plus or minus 0.04mm.
In the just-concluded World Robot Conference, HIT Robot Group also exhibited for the first time a self-developed lightweight flexible manipulator that can work with people. Once contacted, it will automatically stop and protect workers' safety.
"Because of price and reliability, the use of cooperative robots is not universal, but it is still a new product." Hao Yucheng said that from a safety point of view, standards are also being developed, and how far it takes for robots to sense people's distance is safe. There is no unified answer.
Although there are still many problems that need to be verified in the application, robots are already making strides towards intelligence.
“Either Beijing’s World Robot Conference or Guangzhou’s robot exhibition, an obvious feature is that the intelligence of industrial robots has significantly improved over the previous year.” Li Yizhong said that artificial intelligence has now begun to apply to the field of robotics. High-performance, intelligent sensing and control technology, human-computer communion technology, high-precision motion and attitude control and other key technologies, core technology research and development breakthroughs, the intelligence of industrial robots will be significantly improved