In recent years, driven by the rapid development of the Internet, Internet of Things, AI, cloud computing, big data and other technologies, the smart home market has also ushered in an emerging wave. With the continuous upgrading of the cognition and concept of a new generation of consumer groups, a new way of life is becoming popular. Coupled with the boost of the epidemic, the rise of the "home economy", smart homes are becoming the new favorite of consumers because of their contactless interaction methods, and people are gradually realizing the convenience of smart homes.
The market under the "home economy" has exploded
The data shows that the sweeping robot has become the main driving force for the growth of the "home economy", catalyzed by the epidemic, the explosive growth of sweeping robots in China in 2021, and the mainland has become the world's largest market for sweeping robots.
According to Aowei Cloud Network data, the domestic sales of sweeping robots increased from 5.2 billion in 2017 to 12 billion in 2021, CAGR (compound annual growth rate) was as high as 23%, retail sales increased from 4.22 million units to 8.34 million units, and CAGR was 19%.
In fact, the development of the mainland intelligent sweeping robot industry is late, and the household penetration rate is still very low. The data shows that the penetration rate of sweepers in the United States in 2020 is about 14%, and the penetration rate of sweepers in China is less than 5%. However, with the development of urbanization, the continuous growth of residents' purchasing power, and the development of the Internet industry to continuously cultivate users' consumption habits and other factors, consumers' demand for service robots, especially intelligent sweeping robots suitable for home scenarios, will become more and more extensive, and the entire industry market has a very large room for doubling.
The brand head effect in the industry is obvious
With the continuous expansion of the market capacity of the intelligent sweeping robot industry, more and more brands and manufacturers have appeared in the market, and a number of new market participants have emerged in recent years, and the degree of marketization has gradually increased. At present, there are nearly 200 intelligent sweeping robot brands sold on mainstream domestic e-commerce platforms, and they can be divided into multiple categories according to product technology, cleaning ability, quality, price and other dimensions. Market participants include emerging service robot companies, traditional home appliance companies, etc.
According to the calculation of Aowei Cloud Network, from the perspective of domestic market share, the top five brands in the domestic online market in 2021 are Coworth, Xiaomi, Stone, Cloud Whale and Midea, with market shares of 45%, 16%, 14%, 11% and 2%, respectively, with a total market share of 88%, from the above domestic market share and domestic online market share data, it can be seen that the concentrated effect of the brand head of the intelligent sweeping robot industry is more obvious.
For the domestic intelligent sweeping robot market, enterprises with strong brands and independent research and development capabilities will further consolidate their market position. Highly competitive enterprises can use the advantages of capital, research and development and channels to obtain more market share, and the concentration of market brands will continue to be high. The development of the intelligent sweeping robot industry will promote the transformation and upgrading of the entire robot industry.
Navigation systems are a core competency
Intelligent sweeping robot is an industry with high integration of artificial intelligence, optoelectronics, electromechanical, acoustics, mechanics, materials science, fluid power and other fields. Its core component is the navigation system, equivalent to the role of the "brain", is a software and hardware integration system, including sensors, chips and composition and path planning algorithms, software systems are superstructures, core competitiveness is reflected in map construction and path planning capabilities, the most important embodiment is in the algorithm and control.
The indoor environment is very different, the navigation algorithm of the intelligent sweeping robot needs to carry out real-time processing operations, from the perspective of multiple sensors and multiple dimensions, as far as possible to select the most efficient and least repetitive line for planning and walking, and direct the intelligent sweeping robot to achieve complete coverage of the cleaning work.
The control requires the intelligent sweeping robot to walk according to the route planned by the navigation algorithm, and needs to integrate the data of a series of sensors, including but not limited to odometers, gyroscopes, accelerometers, sensors along the wall, etc. At the same time, the robot needs to precisely control the speed of the motor and its own forward and backward, and accelerate, decelerate and steer just right to achieve smooth cleaning operation and high cleaning effect.
Based on the consideration of various factors such as navigation algorithms, motion control, functional services and battery life, chip products have four high and two low requirements, namely high intelligence, high computing power, high real-time, high reliability, low power consumption, and low cost.
At present, in the sweeping robot market, general chips are commonly used, and most of them use third-party open source algorithms and solutions. General chip due to the huge system, the need for mobile phone-level processors, and plug-in DDR and many other materials, but also need a special microcontroller for control, the system is complex and low efficiency, so the special chip came into being.
Dedicated chips have become market darlings
Dedicated SoC chip has the advantages of small size, low power consumption, high cost-effectiveness and high computing power, and integrates key units such as SLAM algorithm and motion control through the special chip, which greatly simplifies the complexity of the program design, and the high integration of the dedicated chip also greatly reduces the BOM cost of the sweeper solution. Dedicated chips have also gradually become new darlings and entered the mainstream market of sweeping robots.
At present, there are few enterprises in the field of special chips for sweeping robots, and Zhuhai Yiwei Semiconductor Co., Ltd. in Guangdong Province is one of the companies that truly realize technological breakthroughs and industrial applications. The company's mobile robot special chip through software and hardware collaborative innovation design, to achieve chip multi-core, algorithm chip, hardware acceleration and design agility, can provide a complete solution, while completing the entry to high-end cleaning robot chip comprehensive coverage, effectively shorten the robot product development cycle of more than 6 months, reduce the entry threshold of the intelligent robot industry, fill the market gap in the industry.
It is understood that with outstanding technical advantages, Yiwei Semiconductor has entered the mainstream market with its industry-leading robot environment modeling and positioning navigation (SLAM) dedicated SoC chip, and has achieved tens of millions of large-scale commercial applications in the field of home and commercial cleaning, serving customers including Xiaomi, Haier, Midea, KARCHER, SEB, Anker and other well-known manufacturers at home and abroad. In addition, the development of Yiwei Semiconductor has also been recognized by the capital market, and has received strategic investment from many well-known investment institutions, including Xiaomi Production and Investment, China Merchants Capital, Wen's Investment, etc., and the product market has been further developed by integrating into the shareholder ecosystem. Relevant data show that the robot SLAM special SoC chip of Yiwei Semiconductor is unique in the field of special chips for sweeping robots, and its market share ranks first in Guangdong Province. With its outstanding market performance, the company's special chip A380S also won the 16th "China Core" Excellent Market Performance Product Award in 2021.
At this year's national two sessions, the government work report mentioned the need to "cultivate and expand digital industries such as integrated circuits and artificial intelligence", and clearly pointed out that efforts should be made to cultivate "specialized and specialized" enterprises, and give strong support in terms of capital, talents, and incubation platform construction. With the continuous improvement of people's living standards, intelligent robot services will not only be limited to sweeping robots, such as a micro semiconductor such as the industry's leading technology of high-tech enterprises, will continue to grow on the road of "specialized and new", product application scenarios will also be further expanded. While promoting the innovation and development of integrated circuits and artificial intelligence, these enterprises have also created more intelligent robot products to serve thousands of households and build a better life.