Industrial robots are widely used in electronics, logistics, chemical and other fields of multi-joint manipulators or multi-degree-of-freedom machine devices, composed of three parts (mechanical, sensing, control) and six subsystems (mechanical structure, drive, perception, robot-environment interaction, human-computer interaction, control). It has a certain degree of automaticity, and can rely on its own power energy and control ability to achieve various industrial processing and manufacturing functions.
China's industrial robot market has grown rapidly, ranking first in the world for 13 consecutive years, and has a market share of more than half of the world for two consecutive years. ACCORDING TO MIR DATABANK DATA, CHINA'S INDUSTRIAL ROBOT SALES REACHED 283,000 UNITS LAST YEAR, A YEAR-ON-YEAR INCREASE OF 0.4%.
It is worth noting that the sales volume of domestic robot manufacturers increased by more than 28%, and the market share climbed by 9.6 percentage points to 45.1%, a record high. In contrast, foreign manufacturers' sales fell by 15% year-on-year, and their market share shrank to 54.9%.
The top 10 foreign-funded manufacturers occupy 7 seats, and although domestic manufacturers only occupy 3 seats, they are rising rapidly with an unstoppable momentum, and the ranking continues to rise. EFORT sold more than 10,000 units and entered the top 10 for the first time, moving from 11th place in 2022 to 8th place in 2023. Last year, the company achieved revenue of 1.886 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 42.11%, and the net loss narrowed to 47.448 million yuan.
In 07 years, Wuhu Chery Equipment Co., Ltd., the predecessor of EFORT, was established, and after more than ten years of development, it has become one of the few manufacturers that have laid out core components, complete machine manufacturing and system integration at the same time, and is one of the first batch of specialized and new "little giant" enterprises in the country.
Its products are widely used in automobiles and auto parts, 3C electronics, photovoltaics, lithium batteries, metal products, furniture, household appliances, food and beverage and other fields, and its customers include BYD, FAW, Geely, Foxconn, Luxshare, CATL, Guoxuan Hi-Tech, etc. In addition to the domestic market, it has also expanded to overseas markets such as Europe, Latin America, and India.
INOVANCE rounded out the top five, ranking fourth with a market share of 6.5%. Among them, SCARA robots (selective compliance assembly robotic arms) ranked first in sales, with a share of about 20.8%. Last year, the general automation business, including industrial robots, achieved revenue of 15.038 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 24.17%, accounting for 49.44% of revenue.
Inovance is known as the "Little Huawei" of the industrial control industry, and more than 10 founding members, including Chairman Zhu Xingming, are from Huawei. Since its establishment in 03, the company has quickly entered the market with an innovative low-voltage inverter, and then entered the field of robotics through the research and development of core components such as control systems, servo systems, vision systems, and high-precision lead screws.
ESTUN sold more than 20,000 units last year, ranking first in domestic brand shipments in the Chinese market for five consecutive years (the domestic brand with the highest shipment volume of multi-joint industrial robots), ranking second overall, and its market share increased to 8.5%, surpassing KUKA (7.4%) and second only to Fanuc (13.3%).
Founded in 1993 and headquartered in Nanjing, Jiangsu, Estun started with the numerical control system of metal forming machine tools, and gradually expanded its business to electro-hydraulic servo systems and AC servo systems, and began to lay out the field of robots in 2011. After the company went public in 2015, with the help of the capital market, it continued to extend mergers and acquisitions around the robot industry chain, and included Trio in the United Kingdom, Cloos in Germany, M.A.i. in Germany, and BARRETT in the United States.
Today, Estun has 76 industrial robot products (including six-axis general robots, four-axis palletizing robots, SCARA robots and industry-specific customized robots) with a load range of 3kg to 700kg, and is in the leading position in the industry in sheet metal bending, stamping, photovoltaic modules, arc welding and other applications.
Last year, Estun achieved revenue of 4.652 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 19.87%; net profit was 135 million yuan, down 18.8% year-on-year. In terms of business, the revenue of industrial robots and intelligent manufacturing business increased by 26.5% to 3.612 billion yuan, of which the sales growth rate of industrial robots reached 40%. This year, the company will continue to increase the development of Europe, America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia and other markets to enhance the international competitiveness of products and services.