China's robotics industry has attained remarkable and substantive achievements in recent years, and is expected to catch up with that of developed countries like Japan in less time than imagined thanks to new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and big data, officials and experts said as the 2022 World Robot Conference (WRC) concluded on August 21. Chinese robotics enterprises have made phased breakthroughs in core components such as precision decelerators, high-performance servo motors and new-type sensors, while progress has also been made in the robot operating system and practical applications, Xin Guobin, Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology, said at the WRC. During the four-day event in Beijing, many Chinese companies, including specialized robot firms and traditional manufacturing firms, showcased their latest technologies and products. A quarter of the 36 robotic innovations featured at WRC are built for pandemic prevention and medical care, including a robot that can perform oral swab tests designed by the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC). The new robot could soon be deployed in Beijing to test airline passengers arriving from abroad.
Hangzhou-based Unitree Robotics attracted widespread attention as the company staged a performance involving 130 Go1 robot dogs. “The performance is to showcase our robot dogs through which customers can learn more about our products,” the company told the Global Times, noting that Unitree has been speeding up the creation of more applications for the robots, not only at the industrial end but also in daily life. The servo motors, decelerators, controllers and most of the sensors of its quadruped robots were all independently developed. The company said that it has applied for more than 100 patents and has more than 80 licensed patents.
“China's robotics sector has formed a complete industrial chain, though there is still a gap between China and advanced countries like Japan in core components such as servo motors and decelerators,” Liu Gang, Director of the Nankai Institute of Economics and Chief Economist at the Chinese Institute of New Generation AI Development Strategies, told the Global Times. With the emergence of new technologies like AI and big data, it would take less time for China to catch up with these nations, he said, noting that China may even overtake them. China released the 14th Five Year Plan for the Robotics Industry in December, aiming to make the country a global center of excellence for robotics technology innovation, advanced manufacturing and integrated applications by 2025. Currently, the self-reliance rate of making certain robots has reached 90%, and domestic companies' competitiveness is greatly improved with lower costs, the Global Times reports.
China is the world's largest market for the application of robots. The output of China's industrial robots reached 366,000 units in 2021, up 68% on a yearly basis. The production of service robots in the country soared 49% year-on-year to 9.21 million units last year. In the first half of this year, the total volume of disclosed financing in the robotics industry amounted to over CNY5 billion, mainly in key fields such as core parts, collaborative robots and surgery robots. According to a report by Shanghai-based venture capital firm Yunqi Partners, China’s “robot density” stands at 246 robots per 10,000 workers in the manufacturing sector, or nearly double the worldwide average.
