Shanghai aims to become global robotics hub

City hopes to attract investors with talent, property, research and development, as well as HR incentives

Shanghai is looking to become a global center for robotics development and manufacturing in 2020, as the city takes the lead in China's economic transformation and technical upgrade, a city official said on Wednesday.

Wu Lei, vice-chairman of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization, which draws up blueprints for industrial development, said Shanghai needs to accelerate its industrial restructuring.

"Shanghai's industrial development does not have to worry too much about volume and speed, but it does have to take the lead in innovation and economic transformation," he said.

"Speeding up the development of high-end technology and equipment such as industrial robots is a must," Wu said at the 15th China International Industry Fair.

According to Wu, the size of Shanghai's robotics industry will reach 20 billion yuan ($3.25 billion) in 2015 - including 5 billion yuan of key components manufacturing.

"The size will reach 60 billion to 80 billion yuan in 2020, when the city is built into a global center for technical development and high-end manufacturing of industrial and service robots," he said.

As China's largest industrial cluster for robot manufacturers, Shanghai currently has a robotics industry worth nearly 10 billion yuan. Industrial giant ABB Group has in Shanghai one of its two global manufacturing bases, while a new plant for KUKA also has begun construction.

But to realize its long-term goal, Shanghai needs to continue encouraging the development of global leaders in robot manufacturing, as well as cultivate and introduce more key components manufacturers, along with robotic systems designers and integrated solution providers, Wu said.

Besides incentives offered in investment, land prices, talent attraction, and research and development, Shanghai also will try to encourage factories to increase the use of high-tech robotics.

The steel, automobile, machinery, shipbuilding, pharmaceutical, electronics and food industries will be the target sectors for robotics applications, Wu said, adding that large State-owned enterprises will take the lead.

Wang Tianmiao, head of the expert panel on robot technology under the State High-Tech Development Plan, said the country will be short 300,000 to 500,000 units of industrial robots until at least 2020.

The International Federation of Robotics estimates that China will become the world's largest robotics market by 2015, accounting for 16.9 percent of the global total.

Over the next two years, revenue in the robotics market may reach 1 trillion yuan in China, the organization estimated.

"Foreign companies have obvious advantages in the Chinese market," Wang said.

He said the reliability of domestically made robots is generally less than those of foreign competitors: The duration time of foreign robots is 50,000 to 80,000 hours, while Chinese robots can last only 8,000 hours.

According to Xu Fang, head of research for Shenyang-based Siasun Robot, the largest domestic robotics manufacturer by sales, domestic companies account for only 8 percent of the Chinese market.

Eventually, however, there will be more outstanding Chinese robot manufacturers, "just as we have seen in the home appliance and machinery sectors", Wang said.