With the transformation and upgrading of the economic structure and the advancement of hard-core technology, the endless domestic robot species are becoming more and more brilliant. Artificial intelligence technologies such as unmanned driving, construction robots, and contactless medical robots have deeply unlocked the unmanned era. Especially in the context of the continuous spread of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, robots suitable for different scenarios have become a rigid need for industrial development.
Currently, China has become the world's largest robot market (table). According to the classification of the Chinese Institute of Electronics, robots can be divided into industrial robots, service robots, and special robots. Data show that in 2021, the scale of China's robot market will reach 84 billion yuan, of which industrial robots will be 44.6 billion yuan, accounting for 53%; service robots will be 30.3 billion yuan, accounting for 36%; special robots will be 9.1 billion yuan, accounting for 11%.
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Robots are known as "the jewel at the top of the manufacturing crown", and they are also an important symbol to measure a country's technological innovation and high-end manufacturing level. Advanced manufacturing represented by robots is becoming a new driving force for China's economic growth. And how is my country's robot industry distributed?
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Geographical distribution: The "important town" is in the Pearl River Delta, and Shenzhen is the best
As the world's second largest economy, China's economic growth, transformation and upgrading have attracted world-renowned robot brands to settle in. FANUC, ABB, etc. are vying to establish production bases in China. According to data from Tebon Securities, since 2013, China has become the world's largest industrial robot application market. From 2013 to 2018, the compound annual sales growth rate of industrial robots in China reached 33%. By 2020, China will be the world's largest consumer of robots.
With the advancement of independent innovation of hard-core technology and the promotion of domestic substitution strategies, local robot companies in China have risen rapidly, such as Estun (002747), Inovance Technology (300124), Evert (688165), Canop, Bozhilin and other domestic brands. According to MIR statistics, in 2020, the localization rate of China's industrial robot field will reach 29%.
As an important carrier for the application of artificial intelligence in diversified industries, the field of robotics has attracted a large amount of capital in recent years. According to the data from Qichacha, the number of robot-related companies has increased significantly in the past five years. In 2015, there were 13,632 robot-related companies. In 2016, the number exceeded 20,000, and in 2019 it increased to 43,352. As of now, there are 212,600 robot-related enterprises in operation and surviving across the country.
From a geographical point of view, robot companies are mainly concentrated in five regions: Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shandong, and Shanghai. There are as many as 55,000 active and existing robot-related companies in Guangdong, accounting for 25.87% of the country; Jiangsu ranks second, with 28,800 robot-related companies, accounting for 13.55% of the country; more than 10,000 robot-related companies in Zhejiang, Shandong, and Shanghai 17,200, 16,600, and 11,700 homes respectively. Guangdong accounts for 1/4 of the national robotics enterprises, and it can be called the "important town" of Chinese robotics enterprises.
According to data from the China Business Research Institute, there are 12 cities in Guangdong Province that have intelligent robot industries. Among them, the total added value of Shenzhen's intelligent robot industry is the largest, reaching 6.15 billion yuan, accounting for 80.7% of the province's intelligent robot industry. %). The province's intelligent robot industry is mainly concentrated in the Pearl River Delta region, especially Shenzhen Yiqijuechen.
In recent years, Foshan has advanced by leaps and bounds in the field of robotics industry and performed brilliantly. In 2017, the "home appliance leader" Midea Group (000333) offered to acquire the German robotics giant KUKA for 29.2 billion yuan. This cross-border acquisition was a sensation. The latter, together with ABB, Fanuc, and Yaskawa Electric, is known as one of the "four major families" of industrial robot manufacturing in the world, and has a monopoly position in some core component technologies.
In March 2018, Midea Group announced the development plan of KUKA for the first time. The former plans to inject capital into KUKA’s subsidiary business in China and jointly establish three joint venture companies to expand the business in the three major fields of industrial robots, medical care and warehousing automation.
In July of the same year, another corporate giant Country Garden (02007.HK), also located in Foshan, announced the establishment of a wholly-owned subsidiary, Guangdong Bozhilin Robotics Co., Ltd. Robots, ready to independently develop construction robots on a large scale and systematically apply to most aspects of construction, "let robots work as intelligently as humans".
Over the past 3 years, Brightland has realized construction robots from independent research and development, small batch production to engineering testing, engineering services and batch commercialization, and has carried out comprehensive end-to-end planning and practice, and built a complete full-cycle closed loop. Bozhilin is the first company in the world to try to use robots to carry out large-scale and systematic building construction, and is committed to becoming the world's leading provider of intelligent construction solutions.
It is understood that due to the harsh operating environment, large differences in scenarios, and complex and changeable construction surfaces, construction robots have very different requirements for core components and core algorithms from products such as industrial robots. For the eight core systems of construction robots, including servo, sensor, navigation, vision, and software, Brightland has invested a lot of manpower and material resources to achieve full-coverage independent research and development. The planning and scheduling system, construction robot operation simulation system, etc. have filled the gaps in the field of construction robots in the world.
As of the end of November 2021, Primus has submitted 3,461 valid patent applications, and 1,640 of them have been authorized; related research and development products have successively won China Patent Award, IF Design Award, Red Dot Award, IDEA Award, Red Star Award, Golden Reed Award, etc. awards.
Entering the field of robotics is undoubtedly a key choice for the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries. Midea Group and Country Garden have successively entered the robotics industry. One achieved overtaking in curves through mergers and acquisitions, and the other completed the leap from "0 to 1" through independent research and development. The methods are very different but they all lead to the same goal. Undoubtedly, they are the first step in the transformation and upgrading of China's traditional industries. Classic miniature.
It can be seen from the previous article that the distribution of robot companies is highly consistent with the development level of the current economic industry. Under the trend of "the strong will always be strong", this may mean that regions with high economic growth such as the Pearl River Delta and the Yangtze River Delta are expected to be far ahead in the field of robotics.
02
Industry distribution: most automotive and electronics applications, huge real estate potential
As mentioned above, at present, more than 43.15% of the global robot market is industrial robots, and 37.2% is service robots. These two types of robots account for more than 80% of the robot market. According to a recent report released by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), as of now, the number of industrial robots operating in factories around the world has exceeded 2.7 million, setting a record high. China is the largest and fastest-growing robot market in the world, and its development speed has no precedent in the history of robots.
According to the data from Enterprise Check, from the perspective of industry distribution, the national active/surviving robot-related enterprises are mainly concentrated in the wholesale and retail industry, accounting for 34.7%; followed by scientific research and technical services, accounting for 23.0% of the number of enterprises; manufacturing Industry, information transmission, software and information technology services accounted for more than 10%, 15.1% and 13.7% respectively; the number of robot-related enterprises in education and construction industries was relatively small, accounting for 2.2% and 1.6% respectively.
The research of Tebon Securities shows that from the perspective of the world and my country, automobiles and electronics are currently the two industries with the most applications of robots, many participants, and relatively mature related technologies.
As early as 2010, the market was dominated by automotive applications. With the rapid development of 5G, new energy and other fields, new application scenarios downstream of robots continued to expand. In the field of industrial robots, the four major industries of auto parts, metal products, automobiles, and household appliances accounted for 41% in 2020, of which more than 90% were vertical multi-joint robots; electronics, lithium batteries, and photovoltaics accounted for 38%, of which 70% % are SCARA robots, and another 30% are vertical articulated robots. There are certain similarities in the needs of these industries in the manufacturing process.
With the advancement of robot technology and the economic improvement brought by the use of robots, the application of robots in real estate construction, metal manufacturing, food and beverage and other industries is also increasing.
According to public information, Bozhilin has formed 12 construction robot product lines including concrete construction, concrete repair, bricklaying and plastering, and interior wall decoration, most of which can be applied to both cast-in-place concrete technology and prefabricated building construction. Bozhilin is exploring the formation of an overall intelligent construction solution for construction robots covering the entire life cycle of construction projects.
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Bozhilin's concrete inner wall grinding robot performs grinding work
At the beginning of February 2021, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development issued the "Letter on Agreeing to Launch Smart Construction Pilots", confirming that 7 projects in Shanghai, Chongqing, and Guangdong will carry out smart construction pilots. The Fengtong Garden project located in Shunde, Foshan, Guangdong has become the first commercial application project of Bozhilin construction robots. It is reported that as of the end of November, 18 types of construction robots have been put into commercial application, covering 25 provinces, over 280 projects, with a cumulative delivery of over 600 units, and a cumulative application construction area of over 5.5 million square meters.
In fact, China is a big construction country and has the largest construction market in the world. The construction industry is a pillar industry of the national economy, accounting for about 26% of my country's GDP in 2020. What does not match the huge market capacity is that the migrant workers engaged in the construction industry are aging seriously, and the young labor force's willingness to work continues to decline. According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, the total number of migrant workers in the country in 2020 will be 285.6 million, a decrease of 1.8% from the previous year. In the future, issues such as labor shortages, rising labor costs, and labor safety will become more prominent.
In the context of the high-quality development of the construction industry, the "robot building house" program is expected to be widely promoted in the domestic real estate industry, and the revolution in the construction industry led by it will soon come. The real estate industry may become another industry that benefits the most besides automobiles and 3C electronics. industry field.
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Double carbon era: robots are expected to flex their muscles
Following China's first proposal at the 75th United Nations General Assembly in September 2020 to "realize 'carbon peaking' by 2030 and 'carbon neutrality' by 2060", in March 2021, at the "two sessions" of the country, " Carbon neutrality is included in the government work report as one of the eight major work priorities in 2021, and China has quietly entered the "dual carbon era".
Undoubtedly, "carbon neutrality" will further stimulate the downstream market demand for robots and smart manufacturing, thereby benefiting the development of the robot and smart manufacturing industries.
The report of Tianfeng Securities shows that the consumption industry accounts for the highest proportion of direct emissions, and the real estate industry accounts for the highest proportion of indirect emissions. As mentioned above, industries such as consumption and real estate may have the most extensive robot application scenarios.
Taking the real estate industry as an example, statistics from the "China Building Energy Consumption Research Report" show that carbon emissions from China's construction sector account for about 20% of the country's total carbon emissions.
As an important carbon emitter in the real estate industry chain, the construction industry is "big but not excellent". Most enterprises are still at the level of "moving bricks, installing steel bars, pouring concrete, and installing formwork". The application level is relatively low. Although the industry has created many world firsts, it still faces problems such as poor product performance, huge waste of resources, prominent safety problems, serious environmental pollution, and low production efficiency. In 2018, the total carbon emissions of China's construction process was 4.93 billion tons of standard coal, accounting for 51.3% of the country's carbon emissions. There is a long way to go for high "carbon emissions" to be "carbon neutral".
In the construction industry, in 2020, my country will generate 2.385 billion tons of construction waste, accounting for about 30%-40% of the total waste, and this figure is still increasing with the acceleration of urbanization and the expansion of the construction industry market. Increasing year by year; my country's construction waste is increasing at a rate of 8%-10%, and more than 60% of cities in the future may be surrounded by construction waste.
In Foshan, Guangdong, the construction waste reuse mobile brick-making vehicle developed by Bozhilin is in the form of a special operation vehicle and adopts nomadic operation methods to carry out deep processing of construction waste on the spot; the vehicle integrates crushing and screening, metering and mixing, Press molding, finished product palletizing and other functions have the characteristics of high degree of automation, small size, and convenient and quick transfer. It can quickly transform the construction waste in the garbage pool into recycled concrete products and directly apply them to the project site.
Construction waste reuse mobile brick making vehicle to produce bricks
According to Bozhilin, as of September 15, 2021, the company's construction waste recycling mobile brick making vehicle has accumulated 450 tons of construction waste and produced more than 200,000 pavement colored bricks (230×115×60mm). And it has laid out 11 domestic invention patents and 3 overseas invention patents.
In recent years, a series of related policies and opinions on green construction and construction waste management have been issued, showing my country's concern and determination for the sustainable development of the construction industry. Under the joint promotion of government policies and market demand, robots represented by Bozhilin's mobile brick-making vehicles for recycling construction waste are expected to blossom everywhere in the domestic construction industry.
In fact, China's robotics industry is booming under the guidance of policies such as Industry 4.0. During the prevention and control of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, various robots such as disinfection, delivery, temperature measurement, and inspection were "on fire" to let all parties see the service capabilities and economic value of robots. The continuously rising application market demand has strongly stimulated the technological innovation, product development, system integration, talent training and public service system construction of the robot industry, creating a good ecological environment for the development of my country's robot industry.
In order to promote the healthy development of my country's robot industry, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other ministries and commissions have successively introduced a series of follow-up industrial development promotion measures. Various provinces and cities have also issued a number of industrial promotion policies around "robots". In particular, Beijing, Tianjin, Liaoning, Shanghai, Zhejiang and other provinces and cities have introduced robot-related industrial plans, and robots are ushering in a bright moment.
