The advancement of technology is changing with each passing day, and the spring breeze of development is constantly changing the direction. With the advent of the intelligent age, "smart manufacturing" is now forming a new entanglement in China.
On May 19, 2015, "Made in China 2025" was issued, and it was officially proposed to use intelligent manufacturing as a breakthrough and main direction. As an important aspect of the intelligent manufacturing field, the Chinese robot industry is particularly eye-catching with its own keyness, policy orientation and capital influx. In recent years, the achievements of China's robot industry have also been outstanding: in 2013, the output of domestic industrial robots was only 9,000. After several years of explosive growth, it has reached 72,400 units in 2016, an increase of more than seven times.
However, the growth of the Chinese robot industry is not always smooth. In the case of congenital insufficiency and late start, Chinese robot manufacturers are also facing the attack of foreign monopoly enterprises. They started to take off, and in the case of "there are wolves before, there are tigers in the back", they gradually "suddenly emerged."
Monopoly of "foreigner"In 2014, it was called “the first year of China's robot industryâ€. From this year, the Chinese robot industry has embarked on the fast track of development. But before this, China's domestic robot market has long been dominated by foreign brands, and domestic robots accounted for less than 10%.
The difference between the Chinese robot industry and foreign related industries is enormous. Since the beginning of the 1980s, the development of the foreign robot industry has gone through more than 30 years, and has accumulated the advantages of rolling level in terms of technology accumulation, production scale and cost control. In contrast, the domestic related industries started several generations later. Coupled with the long-term weakness of domestic manufacturing industry, the development of China's robot industry is weak.
Among them, the throat of domestic enterprises is mainly the production of three core components of robots.
The three core components of the robot are the controller, reducer and servo motor. Since reliable domestic core components have never been developed, Chinese robot manufacturers have to purchase foreign core components at a price far higher than that of foreign counterparts. The cost of maintenance and replacement is extremely high. Taking the reducer as an example, according to Zhang Jie, CEO of Harmony in China, the Japanese HD company, which has a global monopoly position in harmonic reducer, sold it to the robot "Four People" (Swiss ABB, KUKA, FANUC, Japan and Yaskawa, Japan) The price of the four major robot manufacturers, such as motors, is about 2,000, and the price sold to Chinese manufacturers is as high as 6,000 or more. The latter is several times more than the former.
Legend: Laifu Harmony CEO Zhang Jie
"China, as the world's largest robot market, has always been monopolized by foreigners," Zhang said. "If there has been no research and development of domestic core components, the Chinese robot industry will not have any chance."
Indeed, under the constraints of high procurement costs and maintenance costs, domestic manufacturers are also difficult to have a price advantage in the absence of technological advantages, and they have completely lost their competitiveness in the face of foreign competitors like a wolf. As a result, the development of domestic robot companies and markets is limited.
Under such a severe situation, it can be said that the development of China's own core components has reached an urgent point.
BreakoutIn 2011, now Kanop CEO Li Liangjun saw the opportunity: "China, as a manufacturing power, has a great demand for robots. As the Chinese robot market continues to grow, the demand for domestic robots will inevitably increase." Soon, the Kanop startup team formed.
Legend: Carnep CEO Li Liangjun
In September 2012, based on the previous entrepreneurial team, Chengdu Canop Automation Control Technology Co., Ltd. was formally established. At the beginning of its establishment, the company chose to develop a controller that is one of the three core components of the robot based on its own entrepreneurial foundation. The controller is known as the "brain" of the robot, responsible for issuing and transmitting action instructions. Its comprehensive function determines the breadth of the robot in the industrial application. Its performance determines the depth of the robot in the industrial application, so the robot The industrial application is of great significance.
Like other core components, foreign brand controllers had an absolute monopoly at the time. In order to break the monopoly, Kanop has carried out arduous work.
Due to the late start and shallow foundation, the domestic robot body manufacturers were generally weak in technology, and even many manufacturers knew little about the principle of the robot. Faced with such unfavorable status quo, in the process of research and development, in order to open up the market and promote the iteration of its own products, in addition to solving the problems of the controller itself, Carnot has also “more and moreâ€, helping many robotic ontology manufacturers to solve some technical problems of the ontology. And problems with robotic applications. Considering that most of the domestic ontology manufacturers are underfunded and cannot afford equipment for precision calibration, Kanop has specially added a function for precision calibration for the controller. By 2017, Carnot's controllers have matured.
"Because of entering the industry earlier, we can say that we have enough time to grow with our customers." Li Liangjun said. It is also because of the strategy of “grow with customers†and close to the needs of users. Today, in terms of localization, Kanop has already been quite competitive compared to foreign brands. Coupled with the high cost performance, the current sales of Carnot controllers have ranked first in the domestic industry, and the market share in the domestic market is also as high as 45%.
It can be said that in terms of controllers, faced with the “encirclement and suppression†of foreign brands, domestic controller suppliers led by Kanop have taken the lead in achieving “breakthroughâ€.
Coincidentally, at a similar time, Zhejiang Laifu Harmonic Transmission Co., Ltd. was established in 2013. Unlike Kanop, Rifle's choice of "hard bones" is the harmonic retarder with the highest technical barriers in the core components of robots. But similar to Kanop, in order to break through the technical barriers, since the establishment of the team, the team has been trying to focus on technical problems. The latter took about four years or so, invested nearly 100 million in research and development funding, and finally achieved a breakthrough, and developed a domestic harmonic reducer that can meet the basic requirements of welding, palletizing, assembly and installation of domestic industrial robots.
Although the Rifle harmonic reducer has room for further expansion compared with foreign brands, by reducing the delivery time and reducing the procurement cost with high cost performance, Rifle harmonics has also quickly broken through in the domestic market and broke. Monopoly of foreign brands. Today, the domestic market share of Raffles Harmony ranks among the top in the industry and has already achieved partial exports.
With the continuous breakthrough of domestic core components, the entire domestic robot manufacturing industry has achieved a leap-forward development. Due to the decline in the procurement cost of core components, the output of domestic robots continues to grow. According to data released by the China Robotics Industry Alliance, in the first half of 2017, domestic industrial robots have sold a total of 18,519 units, with sales up 19.1% year-on-year, and market value has increased by more than 20% year-on-year.
In turn, the growth of domestic robot production and the decline in prices have driven the expansion of market demand, which has further promoted the technical iteration and cost reduction of domestic core components. A virtuous circle of the domestic robot industry is gradually taking shape. And these are inseparable from the first "breakthrough" of domestic core components.
“The progress of the domestic robot industry in recent years has been mainly reflected in the breakthrough of key components.†Huang He, a partner of Northern Light Venture Capital, who is well versed in the intelligent manufacturing and robot manufacturing industries, commented.
Outlook
“Industrial robots are crucial to China's industrial upgrading. In China, the manufacturing industry is indispensable. Considering the rising labor costs in these years and the rising living standards, more and more young people are reluctant to engage in some heavy lifting. Repeated work, the importance of industrial robots in the transformation and upgrading of manufacturing industry is self-evident." Talking about the significance of industrial robots for China's industrial upgrading, the Yellow River said.
Legend: Aurora Venture Partners Yellow River
In other words, under the overall situation of China's economic development, the replacement of traditional labor by robots will be an irreversible trend in China's industrial upgrading. Naturally, how domestic robots get more “羹†under the megatrend becomes an important issue.
In fact, although the Chinese robotics industry has initially achieved “breakthroughâ€, there is still a gap between it and related industries abroad. For example, the technical level is also based on the harmonic reducer. Although the domestic harmonic reducer has basically met the needs of industrial robots, there is still much room for improvement in the service life.
But China also has its own advantages. "China's own market is big enough to support trillions of businesses," Zhang said. "China's robots do have room for improvement, but it doesn't matter. China can raise its own business until it becomes enough. Powerful, able to get out of the world." In Zhang Jie, who has "manufacturing sentiment", as long as it takes time, and then borrow the East Wind of the Internet of Things, the Chinese robot industry will surely climb to the top like the Internet industry of the past, hatching several out of the world. Big business.
"In another ten or twenty years, there will be a big future for the robot manufacturing industry." Zhang Jie said affirmatively.
Carnep CEO Li Liangjun also holds a similar view. He believes that China's outstanding advantage over other countries is that its industrial manufacturing chain is very complete. Foreign robots are better used in industries such as automobiles and 3C, but they have insufficient experience in other industries. Therefore, the key to the continued “breakthrough†of Chinese companies is to rely on a complete industrial manufacturing chain for a wide range of industry applications. Once a firm foothold in most of the market's main players, Chinese companies will have the strength to enter the high-end industries where foreign brands are still “in the faceâ€.
In response to the chaos of “smart manufacturing†becoming a new enthusiasm, investor Huang He believes that existing policies, investment companies and enterprises should correct their direction in a timely manner so that the new rising industry of robot manufacturing is on the right track. .
Specifically, in the view of the Yellow River, under the general trend of encouraging “smart manufacturingâ€, the government should pay more attention to the small and medium-sized enterprises that are the “main force†of the industry, and appropriately tilt toward the entrepreneurial companies to rectify the “cheat†behavior and guide The market conducts full and benign competition; as an employer, investment companies should “do their homework†seriously, and investigate and avoid “into the pit†instead of squandering the money and mixing the market. Finally, the company is constantly striving for technology. At the same time, we must learn how to deal with investors.
“Manufacturing was once a corner that was forgotten by capital,†said the Yellow River, but there is no doubt that its healthy development will play an important role in the transformation of the Chinese economy.
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