Posted on 08/20/2025 8:59:59 AM PDT by delta7
China is leading the world in industrial robots or programmable machines that are pioneering fast and cost-effective manufacturing. China currently holds over 50% of the world market share in industrial robots capable of assembly, production line handling, service tasks, machine feeding, palletizing, packaging, and more.
Automation is fueling Chinese manufacturing in every sector from automotives to electronics. The advancement of AI will soon provide China with a cutting-edge ability to usher in a new era of humanoid robots that will become a portion of the future workforce.
China installed around 290,000 new industrial robots in 2024, nearly twice as many as the European Union, the United States, and Japan combined. Around 86,000 industrial robots went onto the market across the EU last year, while Japan implemented 43,000 and the US around 34,000. The market share of industrial robots was expected to surpass 2.1 million in 2024, valued at around $9.4 billion USD.
Chinese manufacturers are bypassing rising labor costs and an aging workforce through the use of robots. Factories are scaling their operations to turn China into the world’s manufacturing base. China has the ability to produce these robots at one-third the cost of other nations as it produces 90% of the components required for AI industrial robots.
However, China is heavily reliant on exports for the remaining 10% of key components. Foreign robot makers like FANUC, ABB, and Yaskawa have major production facilities in China, facilitating knowledge transfer to Chinese firms.
Will robots and AI replace human workers? They’ve already begun to do so. Some estimates believe that automation has replaced 1.7 million workers in China over the past 25 years. Around 80% to 90% of low-skilled labor that only requires simple or repetitive tasks has been assigned to robots. In auto manufacturing, for example, robots have been trained to perform 70% of assembly from welding to painting. Estimates believe that around 35.8% of China’s entire workforce will be automated by 2049, replacing 278 million Chinese workers.
These robots are advancing rapidly. They’ve proven effective in manufacturing, but with machine learning and language models, they’re beginning to seep into virtually every sector, including health care and education. The Chinese government has stated it plans to become a world leader in humanoid robots by 2027, inserting $138 billion into a state venture investment fund and providing private sector incentives for any company wishing to invest in the technology.
New robots are equipped with real-time sensor data and the ability to make decisions, collaborate with human workers, and perform multi-step advanced tasks. To train the AI robots, China has developed major human-robot hybrid training warehouses.
Focusing solely on the basic industrial robots, China has pioneered modern manufacturing. Cheap labor was once China’s stronghold over manufacturing, but now, the nation is relying more on trained technology than a human workforce. Creative destruction is happening at a rapid pace where the future workforce will be indistinguishable from what we see today.
“I would urge folks to look at videos out of Russia. They have robots doing everything in Moscow. It makes us here in the US look old.”
Why are you posting Russian propaganda?
Yes we look older. The average male lifespan in Russia is 64 years. The retirement age is 65.
So far, the most relevant comment here. Communist China will need its own chapter in future economics and social-science text books. Every commonly held Western economic notion of free-trade / international trade, market pricing, central banking, monetary-theory, central-planning, consumer behavior, etc... will have to be revised for China.
The underlying nature of human behavior and Natural Law has not changed, but when put through the furnace of Asian statism, Chinese Confucian paternalism and especially - Communist central-planning, atheism, materialism, social engineering and technological control - the results are absolutely bizarre and unseen.
Communist China is indeed a giant, never-before-seen human/social engineering experiment, taken to its limits.
One immediate consequence - the population in this giant social experiment is refusing to reproduce.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2024/03/29/russias-first-ever-robotic-ground-assault-ended-badly--for-the-robots/
“Compaerd to here, where we don’t make it at all?”
Why are you so anti-American?
...will soon ...
... to usher in ...
... that will become ...
... future workforce ...
... Some estimates believe ...
... will be ...
... advancing rapidly ...
... stated it plans to become ...
... the future workforce
I'm not even slightly anti-American.
On the other hand, it is common knowledge that we outsourced our manufacturing capability in order to maximize profits at the retail outlet at the expense of the American worker and factories. That boils my blood, and makes me very angry at this Nation's leadership.
“I’m not even slightly anti-American.”
Then why did you make this false post in a thread on China?
“Compaerd to here, where we don’t make it at all?”
False, no. Exaggeration, maybe.
Robots can only manufacture mass produced items. Robots can’t build factories with robots inside. Most mass production manufacturing requires custom designed machines. Robots can not be used to manufacture such machines. Because the cost of programming robot for just one or two items will be bigger by orders of magnitude than manufacturing with manually operated machines.
“False, no. Exaggeration, maybe.”
False, yes.
Anti-American, yes.
“Can a robot groom my dog?”
Admittedly, that is tough challenge due to wide variations among dogs, them moving around, and the aesthetic quality of hair cutting.
With the state of the art now in robots, a robot could groom a dog, but not cost competitively compared to people. The dog would likely have to be restrictively restrained. An expensive specialized training effort would likely have to paid for up front, and an expensive top of the line general purpose robot would be needed.
The physical robots are getting mechanically much better from year to year (they are already similar to average humans in strength, mobility and dexterity), and when they are connected to big data center AIs, the training for such complex specialized tasks will be dramatically quicker and cheaper - like downloading a new app onto a general purpose cell phone.
That’s not propaganda. South Korea also has lots of robots for lots of different functions. America could look to them as an example as well.
I am an American. You are clearly anti-me. Therefore, you are anti-American. You enjoy looking down your nose at other people, and perhaps even imagine yourself to be special for doing so. Your attacks on your fellows is very destructive to our unity.
“I am an American. “
So is Armstrong.
Yep, good old Neil Armstrong. He was a wonderful American.
Yep, good old Martin Armstrong. He was a wonderful anti-American.
I all for picking the minds of the world best minds.
But your fascination with all things Russian befuddles me. Imagine if the Russian intelligentsia had been allowed to flourish and a capitalist system was allowed to take root and grow. The result would be an industrial and resource powerhouse.
Instead the world was cut up among Putin and Yeltsin’s buddies, anything that could be a competitive advantage was crushed under incompetence and corruption.
For example, the Russian rail system was divided up among the Powerful’s buddies. The amount of skimming off the top, no maintenance, and no investment is a major factor in the Russian Army’s logistics nightmare. A few well placed bombs, and entire regions are cut off. This is how the Russian economy works.
If you want to look at those things, they are a cautionary tale—not inspiration.
You make a fool of yourself. You should stop.
“You make a fool of yourself. You should stop.”
I am not the fool making anti-American posts on about anti-American thread.
Our robotics industry understands it must play catch up in many regards.
I advocate for building up our manufacturing base beyond were it is. You think we are already there. Which of us could influence this topic in a more useful way?
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