CHINA - China has rapidly become a global leader in automation and from 2018 to 2020, industrial robots sales are expected to increase between 15 and 20 percent on average per year.

Annual sales volume has currently reached the highest level ever recorded for a single country. Within a year, sales in China surged by 27 percent to 87,000 units (2016) and the operational stock of industrial robots marks the highest level in the world. At the same time, Chinese robot manufacturers expand their market share at home.

The main drivers of the latest growth in China are the electrical and electronics industry. Sales increased by 75 percent to almost 30,000 units (2016). About one third of the robots were produced by Chinese robot suppliers, who more than doubled sales by almost 120 percent. All international robot suppliers also increased sales considerably to the electrical and electronics industry (+59 percent).

China intends to forge ahead and make it into the world’s top 10 most intensively automated nations by 2020. By then, its robot density is targeted to rise to 150 units – this being the number of industrial robots per 10,000 employees. Today, in Asia  the leader regarding robot density is South Korea, with 531 robot units. In the Americas, it is the USA with 176 robot units and in Europe, it is Germany with 301 robot units.