Chinese robot manufacturers showcased their latest machines at a conference in Beijing, seeking to convince investors and customers that the technology is advanced enough for wider commercial application.
More than 300 companies are participating in the World Robotics Conference, which runs until Sunday, where more than 2.000 products are on display and more than 150 new ones are introduced, Beijing authorities said.
The conference is being held at a time when robotics is becoming a new area of rivalry between the United States and China, and investor interest in the sector in China is reaching new heights, Reuters reports.
Shares of Unitree, China's best-known maker of humanoid robots, rose nearly sixfold during their first day of trading on the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Wednesday.
Robotics an "important force" in China's development
After a successful initial public offering, in which interest from retail investors was more than 8.000 times higher than the number of shares offered, startup Lumos Robotics and the robotics division of China's largest car exporter Chery Automobile told Reuters they were also considering going public.
At the conference's opening ceremony, Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology Sin Guobin pledged support for the development of the sector, saying robotics had already become an "important force" in China's economic and social development, state-run financial media outlet Cailianshe reported.
Although robots are increasingly being used in China for tasks such as food delivery in hotels and on certain production lines, their mass adoption outside of pilot projects remains limited.
"Our most common application scenarios are in logistics," said Zhang Dapeng, assistant vice president of Leju, which makes industrial humanoid robots, as his company showcased robots that move and sort crates and smaller items.
"Large European factories... as well as domestic car factories... use our robots in their plants, whether for moving boxes, loading smaller components or other tasks," he said, adding that their robots have reached the efficiency of a human worker.
Startup Robotera unveiled a humanoid robot torso for sorting packages at the trade show, mounted on a three-wheeled mobile base. The robots can work continuously for between 900 and 1.000 hours and achieve 85 percent of the efficiency of a human worker, a sales representative told Reuters.
Other exhibits included humanoid robots from the company DexForce, which pack mobile phones into boxes, as well as a giant rideable robotic horse.
The company UBTECH has introduced robot teachers capable of teaching English classes and invigilating exams at university exam centers.
Competition helps industry develop
The industry's rapid expansion is reminiscent of China's electric vehicle sector from a few years ago, when a large number of companies emerged in a short time and began to compete aggressively.
"A large number of robotics companies have emerged practically overnight," Zhang Guibing, director of AiMOGA Robotics, the robotics division of Chery, told Reuters on the sidelines of the conference.
"But from an industry development perspective, it has a positive side. It allows everyone to compete fully," he said. "Ultimately, it will help advance the technology and capabilities of the entire sector. From that perspective, I think it's a good thing."
Global shipments of humanoid robots nearly quadrupled in the first half of this year, to 19.100 units, with Chinese manufacturers dominating the market, according to data from Smart Analytics Global.
Still, Georg Stiler, a robotics analyst who advises industrial companies in China, estimates that between 50 and 70 percent of humanoid robots produced this year could end up in "data factories," where they are used to collect training data rather than do productive work for paying clients.
"Competition in the Chinese market could become extremely intense in the future, especially when it comes to costs," said AiMOGA's Zhang, adding that humanoid robots could take about a decade to technologically mature before their application starts to grow rapidly.
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