China bets on bots: humanoid-robot sales seen gearing up, with adoption push ‘very likely’
Robot models are trained on data, and one way to do that is to get them in the hands of people – so the government may expedite the process with incentives, Morgan Stanley says
To spur the broader adoption of humanoid robots, China may be inclined to offer end-user subsidies as the industry rapidly evolves and the robots become more capable, according to a report by investment bank Morgan Stanley.
The comments underscore a growing focus on the demand-side uptake of humanoid robotics. By comparison, most of the year-to-date government policies have focused on the supply side, such as funding for research and development, according to the report, published on Tuesday.
“We think an adoption push is very likely in China” during the second half of this year, said analysts, led by Sheng Zhong, in the report. They added that this “could strengthen market sentiment, and there are events to watch for a tech breakthrough”.
The report stressed that “downstream adoption” would become the sector’s main focus for the rest of the year, citing recent announcements of larger commercial orders.
“Robot models require a significant amount of training data to improve the success rate and efficiency,” it explained. “The push for adoption, and the collection of data from real working scenarios, could help to form a virtuous cycle for R&D and applications.”
Shenzhen-based UBTech Robotics secured a 90-million-yuan (US$12.5 million) purchase from state-owned car exporter MiEE (Shanghai) Automotive Technology – by far the largest deal in the humanoid industry, according to a Friday filing on the China Tendering and Bidding Public Service Platform.