On December 1, Shenzhen UBTECH Co., Ltd. (UBTECH) successfully passed the hearing of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and will become the "first share of humanoid robots" to be listed on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
According to the prospectus, as of June 30, 2023, UBTECH has provided services to more than 900 enterprise customers in more than 50 countries and regions around the world, sold more than 760,000 robots, and has broken through the important milestone of selling 10 humanoid robots.
In terms of domestic policy, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "Guiding Opinions on the Innovation and Development of Humanoid Robots" on November 2, aiming to initially establish a humanoid robot innovation system in 2025, and make breakthroughs in a number of key technologies such as "brain, cerebellum, and limbs", while ensuring the safety and effectiveness of core components. By 2027, the technological innovation ability of humanoid robots will be significantly improved, forming a safe and reliable industrial chain system and building an internationally competitive industrial ecology.
According to a report released by GGII in May 2023**, the global penetration rate of humanoid robots in the service robot market is expected to reach 35%, and the market size will exceed $2 billion. By 2030, the global market size is expected to exceed $20 billion. Robots
In 1973, Waseda University developed the world's first humanoid robot equivalent to life-size WABOT-1, which stimulated the global enthusiasm for the research and development of humanoid robot technology and prompted many countries to devote themselves to research in this field.
Among the existing humanoid robots, UBTECH's walker series is expected to be used in many fields such as home services, business services and education servicesDigit is mainly used in the field of logistics, where it is responsible for tasks such as moving parcels, unloading goods, etc.;Atlas is a project funded and supervised by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and is designed to perform a variety of search and rescue missions, making it distinctly characterized by military applications.
To commercialize humanoid robots, robots need to complete intelligent autonomous movementsSecond, manufacturing costs need to be reduced to a reasonable range. For the former, humanoid robots are required to have highly flexible "large and small brains" and "robotic limbs";For the latter, it is necessary to improve the entire industrial chain, the progress of production and manufacturing processes, and the gradual embodiment of economies of scale.
At present, humanoid robots still have challenges in the integration of motion and interactive functions, resulting in limited usability and high cost of products.
According to the classification of intelligent driving systems, humanoid robots need to reach a level of L3 or above to achieve true autonomous control.
At present, only a few experimental products, such as Boston Dynamics' Atlas and Tesla's Optimus, have reached this level, but mass production has not yet been achieved.
With the continuous advancement of computer and communication technologies such as control methods, artificial intelligence, and deep Xi, the development of humanoid robots is also rapidly iterating.
Tesla is expected to launch a humanoid robot Optimus, which combines highly dynamic motion performance and intelligence, around 2025, and plans to use it in small batches in car factories. If this goal is achieved, it will bring a significant impetus to the intelligent process of humanoid robots.
Humanoid robots may refer to the architecture pattern of electric vehicles and adopt the architecture of "perception layer-decision-making layer-execution layer".
From a technical point of view, humanoid robots are expected to learn from and reuse mature artificial intelligence models in the field of electric vehicles, such as visual recognition and other technologies.
The industrial chain of humanoid robots includes three parts: upstream core components, such as frameless torque motors, coreless motors, various sensors and special chipsMidstream is the manufacturing of the robot body, covering three main links: design, manufacturing and testingDownstream is the application field of humanoid robots, including industrial manufacturing, warehousing and logistics, medical services, business services, and home use.
Diagram of the industrial chain of humanoid robots:
2022 China Robot Industry Development Report, Xingxing Check Sensor plays an important role in the robot "senses" and "nerves".
Humanoid robots need sensors to obtain information about their surroundings and adapt to a variety of different working environments.
Similar to the human senses, humanoid robots may need to have multiple sensory abilities such as touch, balance, sight, hearing, smell, and taste to meet different design needs.
In addition, there are many types of sensors used in humanoid robots, and the potential market space is huge. Once humanoid robots are mass-produced, it is expected to further drive the growth of demand for sensors.
Application of sensors in humanoid robots:
Source**: YOE 6D torque sensors are primarily used in the wrist and ankle areas where a high degree of supple control is required.
In 2023, Tesla's Optimus humanoid robot has achieved fine control of torque and force, especially when dealing with complex tasks such as environmental detection and memory.
In the future, humanoid robots will integrate a variety of sensors (such as A1, visual and force sensors, etc.) to achieve the fusion of multiple information such as touch, force and vision, so as to have better performance in force control.
Judging from the current shipments, the market size of six-dimensional force sensors is still relatively small, and has not yet formed a significant scale effect.
With the demand for six-dimensional force sensors in the downstream market segment increasing year by year, the industry is expected to enter a stage of rapid development.
In the domestic market, Keli Sensing, Yuli Instrument and Kunwei Technology are representative manufacturers in this field.
Data**: Guangfa**, Xingxingcha coreless motor is a special DC motor, its structure breaks through the form of traditional DC motor, using ironless rotor and coreless coil armature winding, belonging to DC, permanent magnet, servo micro motor.
Its name** is similar to its shape, which is similar to a water cup, so it is called "coreless motor".
For a long time, the coreless motor market has been dominated by foreign-funded enterprises, and domestic substitution has the potential for continuous expansion.
At present, the market share of coreless motors is still monopolized by foreign-funded manufacturers, and the industry barriers are high. According to QY Research, the global coreless motor CR5 reached 67% in 2022, with the top five companies including Faulhaber, Portescap, Allied Motion Technologies, Maxon Motor, and Nidec Copal Corporation.
The product advantages of overseas companies are mainly reflected in material selection, body design, mechanical and electrical control, etc.
Domestic manufacturers mainly bring certain competitive advantages to the domestic market with low quality, good service and shorter delivery cycle.
China's major coreless motor manufacturers include Mingzhi Electric, Dingzhi Technology (Jiangsu Leili) and so on.
Coreless motors form a three-echelon competition pattern:
Data**: The three main types of reducers used by GII GlobalInformation humanoid robots are harmonic reducers, RV reducers and planetary gear reducers.
According to data from Huajing Industry Research Institute, in 2021, the market share of Harmony Link, a well-known Japanese precision reducer manufacturer, reached 3550%, in the first place. It was followed by the domestic leader Green Harmonic, which has a market share of 2470%。
The number of RV reducers is relatively small, and there is still a large space for development of domestic substitution.
From the perspective of the competitive landscape, the Japanese manufacturer Nabtesco has a leading position. More than 60% of the global reducer market share is occupied by Japanese manufacturers, and the main players of domestic manufacturers include Shuanghuan Transmission, Zhongda and Qinchuan Machine Tools.
The concentration of the planetary reducer market is high, and the market share gap between the leading enterprises is relatively small. According to QYRESEARCH data, the world's top five planetary reducer manufacturers in 2022 include Saiwei Transmission, Newcatel, Wittenstein, Jingrui Technology and Newstdart, with a total market share of 52 for CR574%。Local enterprises in the domestic market include Newstdalt, Zhongdade, Xinshida and ITG.
At present, the main players in humanoid robots are mainly technology companies, and there are also many cross-border enterprises involved.
Overseas humanoid robot enterprises are relatively early, and domestic companies are expected to catch up with the latecomers.
As more and more domestic enterprises and Internet giants join the competition track of humanoid robots, domestic enterprises are expected to compete on the same platform with global humanoid robot companies to achieve the trend of "competing on the same stage".
Data**: On the software side, autonomous driving technology, AI large models, AI computing power, and training data are crucial. At present, Huawei Technologies, Xiaomi Technology, Xpeng Motors and other companies have shown obvious advantages in AI large models, autonomous driving, and algorithm computing power, and are expected to form a "data closed loop" to further enhance their competitiveness.
In August 2022, Xiaomi officially entered the humanoid robot market with the release of its first humanoid robot, CyberOne.
In April 2023, Tencent's Robotics X Lab announced the results of its dexterous operation research, and at the same time launched its self-developed robot dexterous hand TRX-Hand and robotic arm TRX-ARM.
In August of the same year, Zhiyuan Robotics released its latest humanoid robot expedition A1.
In addition, ByteDance has also expressed its intention to enter the robot market, but the specific form and specific number target of the robot have not yet been determined.
Product situation of representative enterprises of humanoid robots in China:
The rapid development of the domestic humanoid robot industry will promote the coordinated progress of all links in the industrial chain. The relevant layout manufacturers of the main links of the industrial chain also include Inovance Technology, HCFA Technology, Buke Co., Ltd., Best, Wuzhou Xinchun, Keli Sensing, Obi Zhongguang, Aopu Optoelectronics, Topband Co., Ltd., etc.
At present, the domestic ** chain is gradually improving, which will provide strong support for the further development of humanoid robots. In the future, the level of intelligence will be the key factor that determines the upper limit of the market penetration rate of humanoid robots, and the cost will determine its lower limit of the market. Enterprises in the industrial chain will continue to improve the level of technology research and development, reduce production costs, in order to promote the rapid development of the humanoid robot industry.
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