Monopoly by giants, shuffling every 3 years, the survival rule of domestic industrial robot companies
Recently, among the key tasks for 2019 proposed by the Central Economic Work Conference, “promoting the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry” was given the top priority. Although my country has become a major manufacturing country in the world, the problems of “big but not strong” and “complete but not excellent” are still prominent. For Industrial Robot companies, under the unique mode of Chinese manufacturing, it is bound to take a new path.
Industrial Robot Enterprises with Chinese Characteristics
Before talking about the domestic manufacturing industry, let’s look at a set of data.
In the past six months, the manufacturing PMI index has continued to decline. The official data released by China in February has fallen below the critical point of 50.0%, external demand has been weak, and the output index has even hit a two-and-a-half-year low. The PMIs of medium and small enterprises were 51.5%, 46.9% and 45.3% respectively, and the PMI of small enterprises decreased by 2% from the previous month. However, the decline of China’s PMI index was, to a certain extent, affected by the global macroeconomic downturn. Looking at the world, the manufacturing index of the United States, Japan and other countries is showing a downward trend.
In such a large environment, the advantages brought by the rapid development of China’s commercial society will gradually emerge.
In the past few decades, the living environment and elements of China’s manufacturing industry have also been changing, creating a total of three different manufacturing waves. The first wave was the consumer goods manufacturing industry represented by food, hardware, and electrical appliances that started in the 1980s; the second wave was the export processing and manufacturing industry represented by computers, clothing and footwear that emerged in the 1990s; the third wave was Heavy industry with real estate as the leader.
Today, under the pressure of the United States, Germany and other industrialized countries in the past, and the pressure of India, Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries to catch up with cost advantages, China intends to complete the transformation of the manufacturing industry from large to strong, setting off the fourth wave. From the system to quality” wave, and through the “Belt and Road” to embark on the road of Chinese-style globalization.
At present, China is the world’s largest market for almost all commodities. Thanks to the construction of commercial infrastructure such as logistics, the e-commerce industry that emerged in the era of Internet consumption is booming. During the 2018 Double Eleven, the daily turnover of Tmall Double 11 Global Carnival reached 213.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 26.9%; the cumulative order value of JD.com’s 11.11 Global Good Things Festival exceeded 100 billion yuan. Behind these bright transcripts, it reflects the huge manufacturing demand.
Huge industrial chain, huge market demand and perfect logistics system, these excellent domestic business elements are attracting the attention of overseas enterprises.
Switzerland ABB, Japan’s Fanuc, Japan’s Yaskawa, and Germany’s KUKA are also known as the “Four Families” in the field of robotics. These giants occupy more than 70% of the market share of China’s robot industry, and almost monopolize high-end robot manufacturing, welding and other high-end industries. field.
In the past two years, the four major families have successively invested in the construction of production bases in China, which is actually a side manifestation of affirming the development environment of China’s manufacturing industry.
At present, the industries with a high degree of machine substitution are automobiles and pharmaceuticals, while the popular industries in recent years are 3C and new energy. Due to the rapid product iteration in the 3C industry, the process iteration and production line iteration in conjunction with product iteration will bring a large number of orders to industrial robot companies and automation integrators.
Taking the above factors into consideration, in such a large environment, in order to compete with mature service providers, what domestic Industrial Robots need to give up, specialize in, and focus on, all need to be carefully considered.
Survive or not, leave it to time or take the initiative?
Domestic Industrial Robots are bound to flourish, but domestic parts and components have not shown sufficient advantages in terms of cost performance and quality, and the development of the industrial chain still needs time to mature. Aside from development, most of the current industrial robot companies need to consider how to survive.
According to several industrial robot companies interviewed by Yiou,The industry will undergo a round of shuffling within three years, and what will be left in the end are the top 5-10 companies in each segment.Big fish eat small fish, small fish eat shrimp, and shrimp eat green mud. The participants in it either quit, changed their careers, or were swallowed up, and the companies that stayed in the end entered the finals of the long-term tug-of-war.
By analogy with the development of the mobile phone industry, we can observe that national chain mobile phone sellers such as Dixintong appeared in the market when copycat phones were prevalent before, and the stores sold mobile phones of various brands. However, there are only a handful of domestic mobile phone companies that can survive now. Several companies such as Huawei, Xiaomi, vivo, and opop have their own advantages and disadvantages. In addition, they have their own offline stores, and the business of companies such as Dixintong has naturally shrunk greatly. The current industrial robot industry is similar to the early stage of the Three Kingdoms, and the competition is naturally extremely fierce.
As for how industrial robot companies can obtain a higher survival rate in the new round of competition, Yiou has drawn the following conclusions after a comprehensive interview with several industrial robot companies:
Avoid giants, find the market
In the past two years, the application scope of domestic Industrial Robots has continued to increase, and the signals on the market demand side have also been released steadily. At present, industrial robots have served 37 categories of industries and 102 middle categories of the national economy.
In terms of sales volume, the automobile manufacturing, computer, communication and other electronic equipment manufacturing, general equipment manufacturing and electrical machinery and equipment manufacturing industries use the largest number of industrial robots; in addition, furniture manufacturing, food manufacturing, wine, beverage and refining The light industry, represented by the tea manufacturing industry, has seen a good sales growth rate and has become a new industry application point.
Astro Boy RobotThe founder Song Tao said to Yiou, “From a small perspective, each industrial robot company has its own focus. For players who are working in the segmented field, the most important thing is to make their own competitive advantages; From the technical point of view, the performance of the product needs to be further improved; from the capital point of view, obtaining funds one step ahead of others will occupy a certain market opportunity; and in the terminal customer application, some valuable investment must be made.”
Today, several major foreign industrial robot companies have first-mover advantages, and domestic start-ups are not flattering at the supply chain level, so they need to avoid giants and find their own incremental market.
Research technology and innovate
“Many robot companies are actually building blocks, assembling all kinds of parts and then selling them. Maybe because of the current government subsidies, capital blessing and the market’s pursuit, these companies have survived temporarily. , but in the long run, companies that lack core technology will not be able to go far.”Li Qun AutomationCo-founder Yu Chunhua introduced to Yiou.
In response to many claims in the industry about the lack of innovation in the industrial robot industry,MecamanderFounder Shao Tianlan said that, just like the automotive industry, the basic technology of industrial robots and the manufacturing process are actually relatively mature. At the same time, industrial robots are in an era of change, and new technologies and application scenarios are constantly emerging. In the end, companies that can really kill themselves need to take into account both traditional craftsmanship and innovation.
Money is living water
There is an old saying in the financial world, “Industry is the body, and finance is the soul; industry without finance is a walking dead, and finance without industry is a monster.” For enterprises, if they want to achieve industrial upgrading, their internal organization adjustment and re