China is expected to need more than 100,000 robots by 2015 with the growing level of its industrial automation, according to sources with an on-going international machine manufacturing fair.
They will mainly be used in the production of automobiles, engineering machinery, electric machines and electronic products. Robot production line will eventually replace single robotic machines.
Since China began making robots in 1972, the number of producers has grown to more than 200, but most of the robots in use was imported. Currently there are 3,500 robots in operation in China, about 80 percent are imported from 40 countries including Japan, the United States and Russia.
China's big demand for industrial robots has attracted a growing number of foreign producers. A Chinese company has begun joint research and development with a Russian partner.
(People's Daily September 3, 2002)
