Special Assignment丨Zhou Wenping
Musk's release of the Optimus Gen2 humanoid robot in December 2023 highlights that the new generation of robots has made great progress in terms of touch, vision, and force. A-share related companies are currently in a "state of scarcity", but the market demand is gradually exploding.
In the era of intelligence, sensors have become an important bridge between the virtual and the real. According to the "2023 China Smart Sensor Industry Development Report", the global sensor market will reach $57.25 billion in 2025, with an average annual compound growth rate of 11% in the next three years. The report also pointed out that the mainland sensor market is expected to reach 179.55 billion yuan by 2025. In addition, since September 2023, the mainland has successively issued a number of policies on the development of robots, especially the "Guiding Opinions on the Innovation and Development of Humanoid Robots" is the first top-level design document in the field of humanoid robots in the mainland. Under the prospect that the market size is expected to grow substantially, as well as the strong support of policies, the sensor concept stocks in the A-share market, especially the tactile, visual and force sensor companies whose products are most used in the field of robots, are expected to obtain opportunities for performance thickening.
Six-dimensional force sensors are the preferred solution for precise force control of robots
In the video shown by Musk, the Optimus Gen2 humanoid robot can walk 30% faster than the previous generation, and can smoothly perform 90-degree squats in addition to yoga movements on one leg. Behind the steady state walking of Optimus Gen2, in addition to the role of the reducer, it is obviously related to the addition of a six-dimensional force sensor to its foot, which allows the robot to steadily improve in terms of haptic feedback.
Six-dimensional force sensor, also known as six-axis force sensor, six-component balance, six-axis force/torque sensor, etc., as the highest dimensional force sensor, it is actually a force sensor that can detect 3 force components and 3 moment components at the same time, according to the force component and moment component in the X, Y, and Z directions, the resultant force and resultant moment can be obtained. Compared with the simple structure of one-dimensional force and three-dimensional force sensors, which are prone to errors in complex measurement environments, the six-dimensional force sensor is smaller in size, and helps the robot achieve flexible and intelligent control by virtue of its all-round perception, high sensitivity, high accuracy and real-time feedback.
However, due to the late start, the performance of domestic six-dimensional force sensor products is still a certain gap from the international head enterprises, at present, overseas companies represented by the United States ATI dominate the global six-dimensional force sensor market, and the mainland's six-dimensional force sensor manufacturers are still in the early stage of the industry due to technical barriers such as dimensional coupling and calibration detection. According to public information, at present, the listed companies of the mainland's productivity torque sensors mainly include Keli Sensing, China Aviation Electronic Measurement, Haozhi Electromechanical, Hanchuan Intelligence, Bafang Co., Ltd., Suzhou Good-Technetium, etc.
For the robot industry, the mainland has been continuously introducing relevant policy support for many years, especially since September 2023, it has successively issued the "Notice on Organizing and Carrying out the Unveiling of the Future Industrial Innovation Tasks in 2023" and the "Guiding Opinions on the Innovation and Development of Humanoid Robots", among them, the "Guiding Opinions on the Innovation and Development of Humanoid Robots" is the first top-level design document in the field of humanoid robots in the mainland, which has raised the humanoid robot to the national strategic height, which means that the future 2~Within 3 years, the Chinese humanoid robot industry is expected to usher in explosive growth.
The explosive growth of humanoid robot shipments in the next few years means that the market increment space for tactile and visual sensors, which are more widely used in humanoid robots, will be significantly improved. According to GGII (Gaogong Industry and Research), the sales volume of six-dimensional force sensors in the domestic market is expected to exceed 84,000 sets in 2027, with a compound growth rate of 58.64%, of which the sales volume of the robot industry is expected to exceed 42,000 sets; The domestic six-dimensional force/torque sensor market size will exceed 1.5 billion yuan, with a compound growth rate of 44.39%.
Zhongtai Securities judges, "If the conservative/neutral/optimistic situation, the output of humanoid robots in 2030 will be about 720,000, 1.03 million, and 1.46 million units respectively, and the single body uses 4 six-dimensional force sensors, distributed on the wrist and ankle, then the market size of the six-dimensional force sensors required for humanoid robots in 2030 will be about 7.2 billion yuan, 10.3 billion yuan, and 14.6 billion yuan respectively." ”
Among the enterprises that produce six-dimensional force sensors, Keli Sensing, Haozhi Electromechanical, and Hanchuan Intelligent are clear that the torque sensors they produce contain six-dimensional force sensors, and can be used for robots. At present, the latest total market capitalization of the three is 9.2 billion yuan, 5.3 billion yuan, and 3.7 billion yuan respectively, and they belong to the ranks of small and medium-cap stocks.
Taking Hanchuan Intelligence as an example, it landed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board in July 2019 and is one of the first batch of listed companies on the Science and Technology Innovation Board, and is an overall solution provider of intelligent manufacturing integrating automation equipment and industrial software. On December 18, 2023, Hanchuan Intelligent replied to investors' questions on the SSE interactive platform, saying, "Suzhou Hanhai Haoxing Investment Management Co., Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary, invested in Kunwei Technology in December 2020, with a shareholding ratio of 4.56%. Kunwei Technology has successfully independently developed and mass-produced six-dimensional force sensors with an accuracy of more than 0.5%, and currently has a market share of more than 50% in China.
Founded in 2018, the company is a high-tech enterprise dedicated to providing high-precision force sensors (six-dimensional force sensors) and force control solutions, according to the official website of Kunwei Technology. The company is mainly engaged in the R&D, manufacturing, sales and technology promotion of intelligent force sensors, develops force sensor products for robots and other intelligent equipment industries, and provides force measurement solutions and related products for robots and other intelligent equipment, industrial process monitoring, product quality testing, scientific research testing and measurement and other fields.
The six-dimensional force sensor technology owned by Haozhi Electromechanical has been applied to massage robots. On the interactive platform of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, Haozhi Electromechanical made it clear that "the torque sensor developed by the company is mainly used on the whole robot, acting on the end, identifying force and torque, and the company's products have been applied to massage robots and have been sold in batches." At the same time, it is also pointed out that "the torque sensor developed by the company has four major characteristics: (1) 6-channel analog signal input, low-noise instrument amplification. (2) 18 or 24-bit A/D conversion, sampling rate up to 1KHz. (3) Communication protocol: Ethercat, Ethernet, CAN, R485 and other options. (4) Temperature self-compensation, zero drift creep is small, and structure is decoupled. ”
Although the six-dimensional force sensor produced by Keli Sensing is not currently used in humanoid robots and has not yet achieved mass production, the company has made it clear that "it can be used for robot arm motion and work load monitoring, surface grinding and polishing, machining center engraving processing, medical equipment precision measurement and control, etc." "As a company with a high market share for many years, the rise of the new trend of humanoid robot concept will inevitably make the six-dimensional force sensor produced by it have new application scenarios, thereby enhancing the company's fundamentals.
Flexible tactile sensors enhance the robot's perception capabilities
Musk's video of the Optimus Gen2 humanoid robot shows that its arms and hands can move like a human, and its movements are precise, even handling fragile items such as eggs, which means that all the fingers of Tesla's Optimus Gen2 already have some haptic capabilities.
Tactile sense is a necessary medium for robots to directly interact with the environment, and its main task is to detect or perceive a series of physical features when interacting with the target object and the environment in order to obtain information about the object and the environment or to complete a certain task. If humanoid robots want to have human-like touch in the future, they will inevitably require tactile sensors to develop towards high density, high sensitivity, fast response, multi-function, integration and high cost performance.
In recent years, with the development of MEMS technology, new materials and new processes, tactile sensors have begun to develop in the direction of flexibility, lightweight, high array and high sensitivity.
According to QY Research data, the global flexible tactile sensor market will be about $1.53 billion in 2022, and the global flexible tactile sensor market size is expected to reach $5.32 billion in 2029, with a CAGR of 17.9% in 2022~2029. At present, leading companies such as Novasentis and Tekscan, Inc. will occupy 57.1% of the global market share in 2022, while among domestic companies, Nengstar (a subsidiary of Hanwei Technology), Pacini Sensing, Ligan Technology and many other companies have flexible sensor production layouts, but they are still in the early stage, and multi-functional flexible tactile sensing technology is still a domestic "stuck neck" technology.
Of course, from the perspective of flexible electronics (including the concept of electronic skin), there are not a few relevant listed companies in the A-share market layout, such as Hanwei Technology, China Aviation Electronics Measurement, Hongxin Electronics, Zhongjing Electronics, Shenzhen Tianma A, Danbang Technology, Minxin Co., Ltd., Innosilicon, Shenhao Technology, etc., but among them, Minxin Co., Ltd., Innosilicon, Shenhao Technology is a manufacturer of Mems sensor companies, and Hongxin Electronics produces FPC flexible circuit boards...... The only one who really mentioned in public that he produced electronic skin was Hanwei Technology.
According to public information, Hanwei Technology is a well-known gas sensor and instrument manufacturer and Internet of Things solution provider in China, the company has built a relatively complete Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem, forming a system solution of "sensor + monitoring terminal + data acquisition + spatial information technology + cloud application + AI", and its subsidiary Suzhou Nengsida's flexible micro-nano sensor has a clear application in the field of intelligent robots, and actively carries out business cooperation with Xiaomi Technology, Nine Technology, Shenzhen Keyi Robot, etc.
For flexible sensors, Hanwei Technology said in response to investors' questions on the interactive platform of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, "The company's flexible sensors can be applied to flexible pressure, temperature and humidity and other perception, feedback and gloves, fabrics, skins and other scenarios, and will not be excluded in the field of humanoid robots in the future, but it is still in the early stage of research and development." ”
Relatively speaking, although Hongxin Electronics has not made it clear that its products are applied to humanoid robots, it is the first stock of flexible electronics in China, and its subsidiary Ruihu Technology has a certain layout in the field of flexible pressure sensors. The company said on the interactive platform of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange: "The company's holding subsidiary, Ruihu Technology, has formed a deep accumulation in the fields of flexible pressure sensors, pressure sensing buttons, strain films, etc., and Ruihu Technology's products have been widely used in consumer electronics and smart home fields. According to the experiments conducted by Ruihu Technology, the company's pressure sensors have the potential to be applied to the hands and skin of robots. ”
It is worth mentioning that during the period from 2020 to the first three quarters of 2023, the net profit attributable to the parent of Hongxin Electronics decreased by 56.52%, 449.87%, 14.95% and 119.51% year-on-year respectively, while the net profit attributable to the parent of Hanwei Technology in the same period performed significantly better year-on-year, with a year-on-year increase of 298.05%, 28.05%, 4.94% and -49.82% respectively. From the perspective of reasons, the recession of the manufacturing industry is a very important factor. However, as the economy continues to improve, and the humanoid robot industry is clearly about to usher in great development in 2024, the increase in demand for electronic skin will make the fundamentals of the two corrected.
3D vision empowers humanoid robots
Behind the steady state walking and significantly faster speed of Optimus Gen2, in addition to the role of reducer and six-dimensional force sensor, 3D visual imaging technology also plays a very important role.
3D visual imaging technology is one of the most important methods of robot information perception, by using relevant instruments to obtain the image data information of the object, and then analyzing and processing the obtained data information, using the relevant theory of three-dimensional reconstruction to reconstruct the contour information of the surface of the object in the real environment, so that the robot can perceive the contour and distance of the object in the surrounding environment, and use it as a reference for the subsequent execution of the command.
As far as the humanoid robots launched by major technology companies are concerned, most of the products use 3D vision sensors. Among them, RGBD and other forms of depth cameras are widely used, and some solutions are used with LiDAR (Atlas, Digit, Expedition A1, H1). There are only a few manufacturers that use cameras only as vision sensors, such as Tesla's Optimus humanoid robot.
GGII data shows that from the perspective of the global market, the global machine vision market size will be about 80.4 billion yuan in 2021, an increase of 12.15% year-on-year in 2020, and it is expected that the market size will exceed 120 billion yuan by 2025, with a compound growth rate of about 12% from 2022 to 2025; From the perspective of the Chinese market, the size of China's machine vision market in 2021 will be 13.816 billion yuan (the data does not include the scale of automation integrated equipment), a year-on-year increase of 46.79%, and it is expected that the market size of the mainland machine vision market will reach 34.9 billion yuan by 2025.
At present, in the field of machine vision, although Keyence (Japan), Cognex (United States), Burroughs (Germany) and other international manufacturers occupy a dominant position, but in recent years, the continental machine vision technology is also constantly updated and iterative, to Hikvision, Daheng Technology, TZTEK Technology as the representative of China's local machine vision manufacturers have made great progress in core components (industrial cameras, image processing software, light sources, lenses, vision control systems, etc.) technology and independent software algorithms. In the A-share market, the listed companies involved in machine vision include Obi Zhongguang-UW, TZTEK Technology, Baolong Technology, Aopu Optoelectronics, Weir Shares, Hikvision, Daheng Technology, etc., all of which have certain competitiveness in the subdivided field.
Taking Obi Zhongguang-UW as an example, it is an industry-leading provider of 3D visual perception overall technology solutions, and has built a 3D visual perception technology system of "full-stack technology research and development capabilities + full-field technology route layout", and conducts full-stack independent research and development of core underlying technologies including depth engine chips, photosensitive chips, special optical systems, etc., as well as full-link technologies such as SDK and industry application algorithms. Industrial 3D measurement is carried out in the whole field. At present, the company has the advantage of card position in the field of robot vision, and has reached business cooperation with more than 100 robot customers such as Yunji, Keenon, Pudu, and Gaussian, and has built a 3D ecosystem with AI giants such as Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Horizon. On July 6, 2023, the company announced that it plans to raise no more than 1.505 billion yuan, of which 661.5527 million yuan will be used for the construction project of the robot vision industry technology middle platform, and 843.0944 million yuan will be used for the construction project of the intelligent manufacturing base of the 3D visual perception industry.
Another example is TZTEK, which specializes in industrial vision equipment business, covering consumer electronics, semiconductors, PCB, photovoltaics, automobiles and other precision manufacturing fields. In 2022, the company's machine vision system will have a market share of about 18.6% in the domestic market, which is in the position of the industry leader. From the perspective of the company's revenue contribution, industrial vision equipment is the company's main source of income, accounting for 96%, 96% and 93% of the revenue in the first half of 2021~2023 respectively. The company said on the SSE e-interaction. "TZTEK's underlying machine vision algorithms and software are completely independently developed, without using open source or commercial machine vision libraries, and have successfully served many well-known customers such as customer A, and the accumulated technical advantages have ensured the company's leading position in industrial application scenarios. As for the current rapid development of the field of humanoid robots, the company also said on the SSE e-interaction, "The company is paying close attention to the development of the humanoid robot industry, and will choose opportunities to expand the layout according to the development of the industry in the future." ”
In the early days of its establishment, the company's business was positioned in semiconductor design, and its main products included analog ICs. In 2019, the company completed the acquisition of Beijing OmniVision and Shenzhen Spireco, both of which are CMOS image sensor (hereinafter referred to as CIS) chip design companies, of which OmniVision is the top 3 company in the global CIS share. With the help of this acquisition, the company successfully introduced CIS chip design business; In 2020, the company acquired the Asia business of Synopsys, a pioneer in integrated touch display chips, and successfully entered the display driver market. So far, the company has formed an extended product layout of image sensing, touch display, and simulation solution of the "troika". With the increasing attention of humanoid robots, although the company has not clearly applied its products to humanoid robots, the company has made it clear on the SSE interactive platform that "AI vision is self-evident for the technical support of the next generation of pan-intelligent life and industry, and the combination of image sensors and AI will help achieve artificial intelligence analysis with lower power consumption...... The company's image sensor products combined with global exposure technology can well meet the parameter requirements of the machine vision market for image sensors, and have been applied in downstream customer solutions. ”
At present, similar to the above two industries, 3D vision related companies in the field of global manufacturing downturn in recent years have not been exempt, most of the fundamentals are also poor, of course, in terms of the third quarter of the single quarter data, the data has begun to pick up, the attached table of 12 companies, single-quarter revenue has achieved month-on-month growth, and single-quarter net profit has achieved month-on-month growth of 7. Among the 12 3D vision companies, the fundamental data of Obi Zhongguang-UW is significantly better than that of other companies, and if the company's fixed increase plan launched in 2023 can be implemented, that is, the construction project of the 3D visual perception industry intelligent manufacturing base will reach production, it will allow the company to win the opportunity in the future humanoid robot tide.
(The views in this article are the author's personal and do not represent the position of this journal.) The individual stocks mentioned in the article are only for analysis and do not make investment advice. ）