Abstract: In recent years, in the Chinese market, in addition to the continuous increase in installed capacity, the industry of robot applications has also continued to expand. The Chinese market will be the world‘s largest robot market in the future. In this regard, international robot giants have seized the Chinese market. Foreign robot companies represented by the four families of ABB, KUKA, Yaskawa Electric, and FANUC occupy more than 90% of the Chinese robot market. market share.
Tags: robotics, automotive industry, installed capacity
I. Chinese robot market
(I) Rapid growth of China‘s industrial robot market
China has become an important market for global industrial robots. In 2011, China‘s robot shipments reached 23,000 units, accounting for 13.8% of global shipments, ranking fourth in the world, and a year-on-year growth rate of 51%. From 2004 to 2012, the compound growth rate of Chinese industrial robots was 29.7%, and from 2009 to 2012, the compound growth rate was 71.9%.
In 2012, domestic robot installations reached nearly 27,000 units, an increase of 19.5% compared to the previous year, which is higher than the forecast of the International Robot Association. According to the forecast of the International Robot Association and exchanges with people in relevant domestic industries, the growth rate in 2013 is expected to reach 20% -30%.
In 2012, the domestic industrial robot stock exceeded 100,000 units, second only to Japan, the United States, Germany, and South Korea, accounting for 8% of the world‘s stock.
At present, compared with the United States, Japan, and South Korea, the density of domestic robots is still very low. In 2011, the data was only 21 units per 10,000 people, less than the world average of 55 units per 10,000 people. Even if the incomparable factors are eliminated, there is still much room for improvement in the density of domestic robots, indicating that the potential of the Chinese industrial robot market is huge.
In recent years, in the Chinese market, in addition to the continuous increase in installed capacity, the industry of robot applications has also continued to expand.
The automotive industry is still the largest robot application field in China, accounting for 41%, and it is dominated by six-axis general-purpose robots; the consumer electronics, electronics / electrical industry, and semiconductors are labor-intensive industries, and SCARA and low-load articulated types are widely used Robots, accounting for 21% of the total; the metal products industry also mainly six-axis general-purpose robots, accounting for 17%. The food / beverage / personal care industry is also a relatively large area. In recent years, parallel robots have been used to load and unload goods quickly.
From the perspective of the growth rate of various fields, the 3C industry has the highest growth rate, of which the consumer electronics industry has a compound annual growth rate of 20.2%, and the automobile, which has the largest traditional consumption, will have the lowest growth rate in the next few years.
(2) Three factors driving China‘s robot demand
Rising labor costs
Factor 1: Labor costs are rising and demographic dividends are gradually disappearing. Rising labor costs have stimulated corporate robots to replace labor.
2. Declining labor supply
Factor two: labor supply decline. In the mid-1990s, the number of people engaged in manufacturing in China dropped sharply. In 1998-99, it experienced the crisis of laid-off state-owned enterprises, and traditional manufacturing industries, such as textiles, bear the brunt. After joining the WTO in 2001, the number of people engaged in manufacturing in China has begun to rise slowly. However, in the second year of the new century, the post-80s and post-90s labor population has become the mainstream, and they are no longer willing to engage in a large number of monotonous and poor environmental jobs. The shortage of low-end industrial labor in the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta is obvious.
3. Government support
Factor three: Manufacturing industry upgrade and national policy support. Popularizing robots is not only a simple replacement of labor, but also an important means of improving the efficiency and flexibility of the manufacturing industry.
(3) Foreign robot manufacturers grab the Chinese market
The Chinese market is the world‘s largest robot market in the future and has grown rapidly in recent years. International robot giants have grabbed the Chinese market one after another. Foreign robot companies represented by the four major families of ABB, KUKA, Yaskawa Electric, and FANUC occupy more than 90% of the Chinese robot market.
In the 90% robot market share, ABB, FANUC, Yaskawa Electromechanics, and kuka family accounted for 57.5%. After that, the three major manufacturers OTC, Panasonic and Kawasaki Heavy Industries accounted for 16%. However, domestic robot manufacturers have a relatively small market share. In 2012, the domestic brand robot market share was 8%. Individual enterprises generally have problems such as small scale and weak innovation ability.
This competition pattern is related to the domestic machinery used in the automotive industry, and foreign robot manufacturers are usually tied to large automotive companies. For example, Volkswagen only uses KUKA and often buys 1,000-2000 KUKA robots in a new factory. GM mainly uses FANUC, and European car brands also consider ABB more. Domestic auto companies also have their own preferences, such as Great Wall‘s Yaskawa‘s Motoman and JAC‘s ABB. Domestic robot companies can‘t compete in the automotive industry with foreign products. The advantage of foreign robot companies in the automotive industry is because the automobile manufacturing industry that has been retained abroad, and other manufacturing capacity has been transferred to China.
The best robot body is still European products, with KUKA as the top level. After the localization of ABB robots, the quality has declined. Japan‘s Yaskawa, FANUC, Nachi Fujitsu, Panasonic, etc., compared with European and American products, are of high quality and low price, more in line with the needs of Chinese customers. Hyundai Robot in Korea is mainly used in Hyundai Heavy Industries and Hyundai Motors in Hyundai Group, and its export is relatively small.
Japanese robot companies such as Yaskawa and Fanuc attach great importance to the Chinese market. Taking Yaskawa as an example, the robot body was first cooperated with Shougang, and the robot body was recently cooperated with Hangzhou Kelda. And in recent years Yaskawa has done very well in the domestic market layout, with offices in almost every important market. If no domestic company can do a good job in the future, it is estimated that the domestic robot market is mainly occupied by Japanese companies.
The four major robot families all attach great importance to the Chinese market and have invested in building factories in China. However, in the true sense, only ABB has realized localization in R & D and production. Others such as KUKA and FANUC have no real localization. While foreign robot companies have seized the market, they have trained talents for the domestic robot industry and a relatively complete supplier system.
(IV) Status of the domestic robot industry
1. Four major links of the domestic robot industry chain
The robot industry chain includes four major links: core component production, robot body manufacturing, system integration, and industry applications.
At present, the real business that Chinese robot companies can make money is system integration. The key components are not truly localized, causing the cost of domestic robots to be much higher than their foreign counterparts, making it difficult to scale up.
2. Domestic robot cost is higher than abroad
The cost of domestic robots is much higher than similar foreign products, especially reducers. Domestic companies purchase reducers at prices nearly five times the prices of foreign companies. The prices of key components such as servo motors and controllers are also significantly higher than similar foreign products.
3. At this stage, the domestic robot industry is similar to the United States in the 50s and 60s.
At this stage, the domestic robot industry is similar to the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. The robot industry has just emerged and many companies have entered the robot industry. The difference is that the U.S. robot technology was the world leader at the time, and now China‘s robot technology lags significantly behind the western mature technology level.
4.Planning situation of robot industrial parks across the country
China‘s robot industry parks are blooming everywhere, and local governments use government subsidies and tax incentives to promote the local robot industry. On the one hand, it shows that the domestic robot industry is really hot, and everyone is very optimistic about the industry‘s prospects; on the other hand, there may be an overcapacity situation in the industry soon, which is not conducive to the healthy development of the industry.
Second, the development direction of the domestic robot industry
(I) Future development path of domestic robot bodies
At this stage, domestic robot manufacturers cannot directly compete with foreign companies in the high-end field. The success of domestic robots lies in opening up the upstream and downstream industrial chains, producing economical robot bodies, and especially breaking through key components such as reducers.
1. The successful path of domestic robot bodies-opening up the upstream and downstream industry chain
The "five elements of success" of domestic robot bodies: Domestic robot bodies must develop well in the five major areas of "servo system", "controller", "core algorithm", "precision reducer", and "application and integration technology" At least 2-3 of them are good at it.
These five core technologies are called the "five elements of success" of the robot body. Domestic robots need to develop well. At least 2-3 of these five fields are good at it. First of all, the two parts of the servo system and the controller need to be thoroughly understood, and then the core algorithm needs to be better. High-precision mechanical transmission can be purchased. The application and integration can be implemented by the ontology company itself, or it can be completed by the integrator.
2. Open up the upstream and downstream industry chain-"Core Components"
(1) Status of core parts in domestic robots
Although core components have been developed by domestic enterprises at this stage, there is still a gap between technology and foreign countries, and breakthroughs are needed, especially reducers.
Servo motors are the highest-end European and American brands, and the quality of Japanese companies is also very good. Generally speaking, foreign suppliers have more choices, and their bargaining power is relatively weak. The most advanced servo motors in China are Estun, Guangshu and Huichuan technology.
Controllers are relatively well-known by domestic enterprises. At present, domestic companies that have done a good job include Gu Gao, Zhong Wei Xing, Estun, Guangzhou Digital and other enterprises, as well as research institutes such as Harbin Institute of Technology and Beihang University.
Foreign robot companies and Nabo and Harmonic, two major reducer companies, have long-term strategic partnerships, and they need a large amount of purchases, so they can purchase reducers at a lower cost. Domestic companies have weak bargaining power, and procurement costs are usually 3-5 times more expensive than abroad. Among the three key components, the reducer has the largest profit margin. Therefore, the localization of the reducer is the key to reduce the cost of domestic robot companies and increase the sales volume of domestic robot bodies.
(2) Among all key parts, the localization of the reducer is the top priority.
The global reducer market has an estimated capacity of more than 10 billion. RV reducers and harmonic reducers are based on quantity. The two are 6: 4. RV reducers are mainly used for robot joints of more than 20 kg, and harmonics are used for robots of less than 20 kg. Joints, RV reducers, because of the more complex components and higher bearing strength, are more difficult than harmonic reducers, and the investment scale of RV reducer production lines is much larger than that of harmonic reducers. RV reducer companies in the world mainly include Nabotsk, Spinea and Sumitomo, mainly in Nabotsk; Harmonic is the main harmonic.
There are many domestic companies that are developing reducers, or plan to develop reducers. RV reducer companies include Nantong Zhenkang, Qinchuan Development, Shandong Shuaike, etc. Harmonic reducer companies include Jiangsu Green and Zhongji Kemei. At present, it may be relatively fast to realize the localization of the harmonic reducer, and it may take some time for the RV reducer to achieve domestic production. If the harmonic reducer can break through quickly, it can cooperate with domestic robotics enterprises to meet the strong demand of domestic 3C and other industries for small universal six-axis robots weighing less than 20 kg, and promote the process of localization of robotics.
Considering the lack of domestic craftsmanship and the lack of corporate experience, it is estimated that after the localization of the reducer in the future, there will still be a certain gap in the service life and accuracy with the world-class products.
(3) There are two ways for domestic robotics companies to break through key components.
Idea 1: Follow the path of independent research and development of key components. Domestic enterprises such as Nanjing Estun and Guangzhou NC use their original experience in machine tool CNC systems and servo systems to independently develop robot controllers and servo systems.
Idea 2: Take the deep cooperation route, that is, open up the upstream and downstream of the robot industry. Eft and other companies, together with upstream key component manufacturers, such as Gu Gao, Nantong Zhenkang, etc., jointly breakthrough key reducers and other key components.
3. Open up the upstream and downstream industry chain-"robot body"
Similar to foreign countries, many domestic robot manufacturers originated from upstream and downstream related industries, and most of them entered the robot industry within the past 5 years. In addition, unlike foreign countries, Xinsong Robots and Boss Co., Ltd. originated from the transformation of scientific research institutes and are the earliest enterprises entering the robot industry in China.
(1) Different focus of domestic and foreign robotics companies
Chinese and foreign robot companies have different concerns: foreign companies pay more attention to the development of cutting-edge technologies, domestic companies pay attention to breakthroughs in core components, and seek scale breakthroughs in low-end capacity industries.
Foreign robots have also occupied a solid position in the domestic market, but because robots have different requirements at home and abroad, domestic robot companies also have opportunities. Foreign countries require robots to operate for 10-15 years, but the cost is very high. Domestic customers may focus on requiring that the cost be recovered within two years. Therefore, the robot market in China may not have high requirements on life span, but it has high requirements on cost recovery period. While reducing the number of people required, the shorter the payback period, the better.
(2) Economic Ontology is the main development direction
Under the circumstance of different domestic and foreign concerns about the robot industry, economical ontology is the development direction of domestic robots in this embodiment, including low-cost six-axis universal robots and three- and four-axis dedicated robots. In a broad sense, the automation equipment that can be freely programmed is considered a robot, which can well realize manual replacement.
As the foreign robot industry accompanies the growth of the automotive industry, and the automotive industry has very high requirements for robot accuracy, efficiency and stability. In the automotive field, domestic companies cannot compete with foreign companies in the short term. Therefore, domestic enterprises should focus on the development of economic robots for general manufacturing industries other than the automotive industry.
The so-called economical ontology is divided into two categories: first, domestic six-axis articulated robots that can make breakthroughs in domestic core components, and domestic robot companies can mass produce and reduce costs; For example, scara robots and desktop robots used in the electronics industry are special planes in the economic body. In addition, truss robots for loading and unloading machine tools are also special machines. Such special-purpose robots usually have three or four axes, and they are often called manipulators abroad.
Special robots, such as truss robots and desktop robots, can usually avoid the disadvantages of switch parts and components being subject to foreign companies. For example, the truss robot joints are connected in parallel, and the errors of each joint are not accumulated. Unlike the six-axis universal robot, the joints are connected in series. The accuracy requirements for each joint are very high. The error of each joint will accumulate, which will cause terminal operations. The error is large. Therefore, the special plane can use a lower precision transmission.
