Can the hottest Chinese industrial robots break th

Can Chinese industrial robots break through like high-speed rail

however, Liu Jinshi, the founder of Changzhou Jinshi robot, is optimistic because he is not controlled by others in key parts

traditional joint robots (i.e. manipulator robots) need three types of core components: high-precision reducer, servo motor and control system. Among them, the high-precision reducer almost completely depends on imports

in a six axis multi joint robot, the high-precision reducer accounts for 30% or more of the total robot cost. Songxiaogang, executive vice president of China Machinery Industry Federation and executive director of China robot industry alliance, told China Weekly that this part of the world market has long been monopolized by Japanese enterprise nabotsk, which is the world's largest manufacturer of high-precision gear reducers. The price of their gear reducers sold to Chinese enterprises is five to eight times that sold to Japanese, German and other similar enterprises

from the perspective of technical route, Jinshi robot has found another way, mainly focusing on truss robot, which is a rectangular coordinate robot different from joint robot. It is very suitable for the automation of numerical control machine tools and heavy-duty high-speed handling industries of metal processing, and can provide systematic solutions for unmanned factories. Under this technical route, high-precision reducer is not a core component, nor will it be subject to foreign enterprises

however, for this enterprise, which has been established for nearly seven years, how to squeeze into the market long occupied by foreign high-end brands and truly overcome the profit barrier is still a test. The company was listed on the new third board in 2016. The announcement shows that the operating revenue in 2014 and 2015 was 60.9619 million yuan and 51.9732 million yuan respectively, but it has not yet achieved profit, and the net profit was -1.1561 million yuan and -7.2245 million yuan

this is also a common problem faced by many domestic robot brands. In 2013, China surpassed Japan to become the largest robot market in the world. In 2015, the sales volume of industrial robots in China was 69000 units, accounting for nearly 30% of the global market share, but domestic brands accounted for only 7% of the sales volume in the Chinese market

government departments expect China's industrial robots to replicate China's high-speed rail model and exchange independent innovation for the market in the future. However, unlike the concentration of high-speed rail technology in the hands of several large enterprises, in the field of robots, there are risks of low-end industrialization of high-end industries and overcapacity of low-end products. During the two sessions this year, xinguobin, Vice Minister of the Ministry of industry and information technology, reminded

the technical route has found another way

stimulated by a series of favorable policies such as made in China 2025, China's industrial robot industry is experiencing blowout growth

machine replacement is becoming the hottest topic in the current manufacturing industry, and it is also the general trend

according to the data released by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), the number of robots used in Chinese factories will exceed that of other countries in 2017, but the robot density is far behind that of other countries with higher industrialization. At present, there are only 30 robots per 10000 workers in China's manufacturing industry, while the numbers in South Korea, Japan, Germany and the United States in this field are 437, 323, 282 and 152

according to the goal put forward in the five-year plan for the development of robots in China, by 2020, the density of robots in China will reach more than 150, and it is expected that the application scale of robots in China will rank first in the world in 3-4 years

but in such a seductive market, four families have the right to speak: ABB in Switzerland, FANUC in Japan, Yaskawa electric in Japan, and KUKA in Germany. In addition to the four families in the first tier, many overseas robot manufacturers have also entered the layout in China

at present, the four families account for more than 60% of the global market share of industrial robots, and are absolutely leading in the research and development of core technologies and key components, while domestic manufacturers have not yet challenged the strength of the four families

among the three core components of the robot, the domestic control system can basically meet the current needs. However, if you want to enter the automotive field, you need to import controllers with higher requirements. The servo motor is similar to the controller. There is no problem at the low end. The middle end products can also meet the requirements. The reducer has the biggest problem. Song Xiaogang told China Weekly that the principle and design of Chinese and foreign brand reducers are basically the same, but there is a big gap in process accuracy and stability

the reducer is composed of dozens of small parts and gears, which will be affected by different materials, temperatures and processing speeds. The improvement of each processing accuracy depends on the accumulation of technology, and more importantly, on the exploration of processing technology. Song Xiaogang said that at present, some domestic brands have been able to achieve small batch production, such as Nantong zhenkang, whose sales reached 12000 units in 2016, while Japan's nabotsk, which ranks first in the world, has an annual sales volume of 250000 to 300000 units, which is not in the same order of magnitude. Under the condition of mass production, how to maintain the consistency of product performance and accuracy is the weakness of local brands

in addition to relying on time accumulation, it is also a realistic path for domestic brands to break through on the technical route. This is the case for Jinshi robot

truss robot is different from joint robot. I have all the core technologies, and even I have none abroad. Liu Jinshi told China Weekly that the core of truss robots is the guide rail technology, which was first used in warships. It requires that it should not be deformed for 20 years and has strong stability requirements. This kind of guide rail is not available in China, nor is it made of materials. We buy it from Germans, and Germans don't sell it

it is very difficult to buy finished products from Germany, analyze images, make raw materials, and then to the most difficult heat treatment link. Liu Jinshi led the company's research team to explore for six years before overcoming the problem. The guide rails are spliced one meter by one meter. It is required that there should be no seams and accumulated errors, but now we can splice 200 meters long

traditional joint robots have been used in the field of automobile manufacturing for a long time, but at present, they are basically occupied by foreign brands, and it is difficult for domestic independent brands to take a share

joint robot, the load is generally less than 300 kg. There are very few manufacturers that can manufacture heavy-duty joint robots with a weight of more than 300 kg. Even if they can produce dozens of robots, the output is very small. Liu Jinshi said, The biggest advantage of truss robot is its large size (be careful not to touch the active pointer load. The largest thing that can grasp a 4-ton weight.

at present, Swiss manufacturers can achieve a load of 2.5 tons, German Liebherr can achieve a load of 1 ton, and we can achieve 4 tons. There is no mature case of making a ton robot in China, just our family. Liu Jinshi said that the significance of making a 4-ton robot is to fully realize flexible production and unmanned factories. Traditional logistics are all on the ground and on the ground track Lines and forklifts are all running on the ground. The logistics without artificial factory is in the sky, and the equipment shuttles freely above, which can realize the flexible production of the whole plant, and can walk in a super large space, while the ground is reserved for people to maintain the equipment

what we define as nobody is that there can be no one in the production process. There is no one in the raw material handling, online, outgoing, testing and packaging of the production process. He said

in Liu Jinshi's view, bypassing joint robots and focusing on truss robots is also the field in which domestic brands are most likely to defeat foreign brands. Foreign countries have experience in technology accumulation, which does not mean that they have strong engineering ability. We do engineering for users for 4 to 6 months, and there are few projects over a year, but it takes two years to do a project abroad, and the price is difficult to accept. This is our strength, which is very similar to high-speed rail. It is system engineering

this also means that from the level of the highest competent department of the industry, we have confirmed our concerns about the low-end of high-end industries and the overcapacity risk of low-end products in the current industry

in this industry, this worry about mercenaries is not new: overcapacity and disorderly competition in middle and low-end products have begun to appear, and a considerable number of enterprises are mainly integrated assembly production, staying in the stage of imitation, follow-up and simple integration

according to the white paper on the development of China's robot industry (2016 Edition) released by the China Institute of electronic information industry development, domestic industrial robots are mainly medium and low-end products, mainly handling and loading and unloading robots, mostly three-axis and four axis robots. The market for six axis or more high-end industrial robots used in automotive manufacturing, welding and other fields is mainly occupied by Japanese and European and American enterprises, Domestic six axis industrial robots account for less than 10% of the new installed capacity of industrial robots in China

another funny phenomenon is that in many exhibitions in recent years, industrial machines that were originally intelligent equipment, namely 0.5 ⑴% precision machine people, have been used to perform singing and dancing. In the view of many insiders, this kind of performance is neither intelligent nor core technology

according to song Xiaogang, there are two reasons for this problem: first, many state-owned brands have low added value, and key parts are controlled by others, resulting in high costs and low profits. On the other hand, at present, the threshold to enter the robot industry is actually very low. The manipulator can be outsourced (outsourced procurement), the controller can be purchased, the precision reducer can be purchased, the servo motor can be purchased, and even the application software can be developed by others, which is equivalent to your enterprise only assembling a robot

Changzhou Mingsai robot has also gone through such a detour. Mingsai is a typical enterprise for the industrialization of scientific research achievements of university teachers. Its founder Qu Dongsheng was a teacher of Harbin Institute of technology

before 2014, Mingsai's industrialization achievement transformation process was not smooth. At that time, the company felt that it could do anything and accept any project. After running for a period of time, I found that after a few years, there was no achievement in technical precipitation except for building a building. Jiang Xiaofei, the Secretary of Mingsai, told China Weekly that Mingsai was first used to make dispensing machines for loudspeakers, but now people who make dispensing machines are everywhere

in Jiang Xiaofei's view, dispensing machine is a typical overheated industry. This product does not require high precision, and the industry threshold is not high, but the gross profit margin of 40% is normal, leading to many investors pouring in. When demand is not proportional to supply, a price war begins

since 2014, Mingsai has decided to transform. Jiang Xiaofei said that the direction of transformation, first of all, is to have a large enough market capacity. Secondly, we will consider whether the technical barriers are high enough. It is not a local boss who can throw money into it

Mingsai finally chose personal media terminal equipment, such as intelligent production equipment, the core component of, as the starting point. Jiang Xiaofei told China Weekly: the production equipment of parts and components has high requirements for automation. For example, double photography, which has been popular since 2016, used to be single photography. In this way, the original equipment can't keep up with the pace. Each camera module has a motor drive, which is very fine. It is completely impossible for human eyes to operate, and it all depends on machines

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