On March 6th, Beijing time, the Haier Smart Home-Service Robots Strategy Conference was held in Shanghai to demonstrate the global determination of Haier's advancement into the robot field. In an era of global embrace of robots, Chinese companies introduced technologies or developed their own technologies. Involved in this - in the field of home appliances, Midea, Haier is the two pioneers to explore the robot industry earlier, but it has come out of a different path. Midea focuses on the field of industrial robots and aims to enhance industrial automation capabilities. Fan Haier set foot in the service robot industry and took the lead in proposing a strategic layout for upgrading service robots from a single function to a whole scene. At the same time, it started the service robot ecosystem for the first time, adding another layer to the smart home first platform brand.
It is worth noting that at this conference, Haier announced that it had reached a strategic cooperation relationship with Softbank robots. For many years, Softbank Robotics has become a leader in the field of humanoid robots, and its research and development robots Pepper and NAO provide and retail, finance, Innovative services related to healthcare, travel and service industries cover more than 70 countries in the world. Through the joint efforts of both parties, it will be a unique development path for the service robot industry.
We can't help but ask: With the entry of Haier, what kind of development will China's robots have? What is the impact of the difference between the two large home appliances companies represented by Haier on the strategy of robots? In doubt, the author explored the layout of the Chinese robot industry.
Status Quo of the Industry: Home Appliance Firms Power Robots, Development Paths are Different
According to the statistics of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, there are more than 1,000 companies involved in the production of robots in China, of which more than 200 are robotic body manufacturing companies. Most of them are assembled and subcontracted, are at the low end of the industrial chain, have low industrial concentration, and have a small overall scale. Compared to the low-end groups of OEM companies, home appliance companies have demonstrated stronger capabilities in the field of robotics in recent years. Next we will use the US and Haier as examples to make horizontal comparisons.
As stated in the opening article, Mei's, Haier represents two very different development paths for Chinese robots. Among them, Mei's initial hope was to achieve rapid deployment of the robotics industry through cooperation with well-known foreign robot companies. In 2015, Midea first announced Cooperation with Japan Yaskawa Electric Co., Ltd. In May of the same year, Midea acquired German industrial robot manufacturer KUKA.
Then, after continuous cooperation and after the acquisition, what is the performance of Midea in the robotics industry? From the actual situation, the acquisition of KUKA helps Midea accelerate the automation of its home appliance factory production and can meet the needs of the United States to increase the efficiency of automated production. It can be said that in the next few years, KUKA will give the United States a reconstructed production line, which will bring about a noticeable improvement in manufacturing speed.
Because of this, 90% of Midea’s product layout is industrial robots, and service robots account for less than 10%. Compared with the former, Midea’s service robots are slightly thin, and the products are mainly assisted robots used in hospitals, and Single-scene robots with relatively simple functions such as sweeping robots, and this type of single robot lacking physical space connection actually represent the status quo of the service robot industry. For the entire industry, the acquisition will inevitably bring about an improvement in performance, but next You also need to bring better experiences to users through the integration of foreign technologies.
Let's look at Haier again. In recent years, Haier has made remarkable achievements in the field of smart homes, which also provides a reliable platform and basis for Haier to develop service robots. 'Service robots are an important support for Haier's smart home brand and a natural extension of Haier's smart home strategy. 'Unlike industrial robots on the factory's assembly line, service robots, as one of Haier's smart home portals, will be more focused on providing users with Full scene smart experience.
At the press conference, Haier and Softbank Robotics joined forces to develop the market. The two sides will use the humanoid robot Pepper of Softbank robots to jointly explore the market. Through the live video, we have shown us the service scene of Pepper: In the future family scene, Pepper can be linked The water heater in the smart bathroom reserved the bath for the family in advance; in the smart bedroom, Pepper can actively adjust the lighting, and turn on the air conditioner according to the indoor air conditions; in the smart kitchen, Pepper can control the oven, range hood, etc. according to the family's lifestyle, and assist in cooking. A meal. In the business scene in the future, Pepper can provide thousands of thousands of differentiating marketing programs for different customers. It can explain various product information for customers and demonstrate multimedia scenes; after the operation, Pepper can Helping the manager analyze the sales situation and inventory inventory. Compared to the current human service robot products, Haier will create a differentiated service robot product by solving the needs of life and business scenarios in depth, combining mature artificial intelligence to solve users' pain points. To a new life, commercial scene experience.
Future Trends: Intelligent robots around you become an industry watershed
Well-known international robot maker Inge and Microsoft founder Bill Gates had once imagined that robots would go deep into the future of millions of households. Famous enterprises and big brothers' 'bots around' are being used by Midea and Haier. Different paths have become reality, and the most critical one is 'How to realize intelligent human-machine interaction in multiple scenarios'. Haier Wang also mentioned at the press conference that Haier will adhere to the layout of service robots. The user's needs are the center, focusing on enriching the product ecology, improving the human-computer interaction experience, and finally making Haier's smart home solution more perfect, making the home more perfect.
Some experts believe that: As the society transitions to an intelligent lifestyle, service robots are becoming the 'new darling' of the robotics market. All future services will be based on artificial intelligence. It is expected that within the next two to three years, service robots There will be large-scale outbreaks, and people will receive more and more robots.
At the technical level, the maturity of service robot related technologies, market acceptance and adoption have become higher and higher, and the innovative applications of entrepreneurs have caused the development of service robots to reach the critical point. For example, we have released a video from Haier. It can be seen that the service robot Pepper can actively connect smart home appliances and smart devices in different scenarios in the smart home according to the user's instructions and living habits, provide hot water reservations for the user, intelligently identify clothing care and health index reminders, etc. Interconnected life support. This kind of active learning, the intelligent service capabilities of human-computer interaction, make service robots have great development difficulties, and thus become a watershed for the robot industry.
At the market level, the current service robots are confined to a single scenario, single task, and there is not a small gap between the “wisdom housekeeper” service robots that people expect to perform common and complex tasks, and this will also be the breakthrough point for future market growth. Published by Haier Looking at the service robot strategy, we can realize full-house full-scenes services for smart homes, help users to bring about a better life experience, and upgrade; in terms of smart stores, they can help improve the conversion rate into stores, enhance customer experience, and increase operational efficiency. In assisting the elderly in assisting the disabled, to meet the specific needs of specific groups of people.
In the long-term perspective, smart homes, as the smallest unit of a smart society, will surely be the major development trend of the future. In light of this, Haier focused on intelligence and interconnection, actively deployed in the service robot industry, and delivered its own Internet to global consumers. Understanding. Through cooperation with Softbank robots, Haier announced its determination to open up the Chinese service robot market. That is, future product applications will be the first to land smart homes and smart stores, but not limited to these two scenarios, but Continued coverage in more areas. More importantly, as service robots enter the ecological development track, a large number of industries and neighboring industries and resources will be mobilized to form a benign environment for common upgrading.
In the past 13 years, Haier has persisted in exploring the 'one-man-one-in-one' model. Through a production model directly linked to user needs, it has effectively grasped user needs and achieved mass customization.
The future of China’s robotics industry needs more explorers like Haier and Midea. Diversified development is more in line with Chinese-style industrial logic, namely, model-driven upgrading. This time, Haier’s strategy of building a smart home resolutely positions service robots. It follows the performance of the 'one-man-one-in-one' model: Starting from the actual needs of users, it effectively resolves the pain points of users and truly allows users to enjoy the changes brought about by cutting-edge technologies such as service robots, helping users achieve a smart life.