Industrial robots have become an inevitable trend in place of artificial labor

I. Analysis of China's industrial robot market

In 2013, the sales volume of China Industrial Robots (300024) reached 36,860 units, surpassing Japan to become the world's largest robot market. Among them, self-owned brand enterprises sell more than 9,500 industrial robots in China, accounting for 1/4 of the national industrial robot sales. It is estimated that the output value of the ontology is about 9 billion yuan, and the market size of the ontology plus integration is about 27 billion yuan.

In 2014, the Chinese market sold 57,000 industrial robots, an increase of 55% over the previous year, accounting for about a quarter of the total global market sales. It has become the world's largest industrial robot market for two consecutive years.

Two major factors drive the rapid growth of China's industrial robot market.

The first driving force is the machine instead of labor. The reasons are mainly from two aspects:

One is the lack of supply of low-end labor. After 80 and 90, it has become the main force of the current labor market. Compared with 60 and 70, they have more demands. One of the significant changes is that fewer and fewer people are willing to work in low wages, monotonous repetitions and poor environment. This has led to a shortage of low-end labor supply. This phenomenon of “labor shortage” is particularly evident in coastal areas at the end of the year. Employers are increasingly inclined to use robots instead of labor to engage in such jobs.

The second is the continuous improvement of the industrial economy of industrial robots. On the one hand, labor wages have risen across the board. Since the reform and opening up, the average annual wage of urban employed people in China has basically maintained a double-digit growth rate. By 2010, it has exceeded 5,000 US dollars, and due to the shortage of low-end labor supply, the wage increase of migrant workers has been faster than that of urban workers in recent years. On the other hand, the price of the robot body is declining. The decline in robot prices is not only an international trend, but also because major international giants have set up assembly lines in China, reducing the cost and price of the body. Following abb, Yaskawa and KUKA also began to build assembly lines in China and put into production in 2013. The final annual output of the two companies in China will total 11,000 units, equivalent to nearly half of the demand for industrial robots in China in 2011. Kawasaki also announced on December 24, 2012 that it would build an assembly line in China.

The above two factors have led to the continuous improvement of the economics of industrial robots instead of labor. The investment recovery period of industrial robots is getting shorter and shorter, and some can return to this even in two years.

The second driving force is industrial upgrading. During the economic transformation of Japan, South Korea and other countries, the economic growth rate has dropped sharply. Japan's GDP has grown at an average annual growth rate of 9.22% from 1956 to 1973, and the annual average compound growth rate has dropped to 3.95% from 1974 to 1991. The industrial structure has also emerged. Three changes: First, the proportion of traditional heavy chemical manufacturing in the total economic volume has gradually shrunk, and intra-industry restructuring and integration have been significantly strengthened. Second, the scale of emerging industries with high added value and technology-intensive has expanded rapidly, mechanization, automation and The large-scale popularization of intelligent equipment has led to a significant increase in production efficiency and competitiveness. Third, the proportion of service industry has increased and consumption has been coexisting.

In contrast, China's current economic development is similar to that of Japan in the early 1970s. Labor costs rise, energy shortages, resource scarcity, serious environmental pollution, timely adjustment of economic structure, vigorous development of knowledge and technology-intensive industries, and promotion of upgrading are the smooth transition of China's economy. The key to the middle-income trap, and economic restructuring and industrial upgrading require a large number of automated equipment packages.

(1) China will popularize industrial robots in the fastest 15 to 20 years

The Chinese government's support policies for industrial robots are no less than those of Japan and South Korea. Local companies have already accumulated a certain amount of money and gained a 25% market share. Despite the high application cost, industrial robots have been installed. Double growth has become a fixed trend. It is expected that the scale of Chinese robot application will rank first in the world within 3-4 years. In 10 years, the robot density will exceed 500 for every 10,000 workers. If external factors do not fluctuate significantly, it is expected that China's industrial robots will provide more productivity than enterprise workers in all industries in 2030.

(II) Enhancing the quality and breadth of the industry in the era of industrial robots

The full application of robots will have a profound impact on production methods and efficiency, industrial structure and even lifestyle. First of all, to achieve flexible production intelligence. The production model will shift from centralized to decentralized, product homogenization to individualization, and real-time optimized and self-organized industrial chain. Secondly, it will have a major impact on China's industry and related industries. As the popularity of industrial robots puts very high demands on other intelligent manufacturing equipment, it will drive the development of the entire intelligent manufacturing equipment industry, leading to a new industrial PC, networked PLC, The ultra-trillion market for automation and communication components, high-precision sensors, smart instrumentation, intelligent production lines and other related machine parts will be created. In the end, the popularization of industrial robots will bring new changes in the working methods and environment for the employees. The new intelligent automated production work mode makes the work no longer restricted by the geographical location of the factory, and is transformed into a virtual, geographically flexible remote way. Employees will have a high degree of management autonomy, adjusting and switching work and life status at any time.

(3) The era of industrial robots poses more challenges to society

The era of industrial robots will also bring more challenges to society, and the situation of technical unemployment is extremely severe. It is estimated that after the full application of robots, China will release more than 240 million people in employment, mainly based on the mature productive labor of primary education. How much of this can be forced to transform into technical personnel or transfer services, and even entrepreneurial solutions. The impact on China and the world can only be proved through practice. In view of the far-reaching impact of the robot tide, China's laws and regulations, ideology, and social structure are not prepared. But in any case, just as cars replace Hummers, computers instead of typewriters, and the Internet replace traditional communication methods, the trend of robots replacing artificial labor in industrial production is bound to come.