In recent years, service robots have ushered in explosive growth. According to relevant statistics, the sales of service robots are expected to exceed RMB 30 billion by 2020. As an emerging field in the robotics industry, service robots are highly integrated with innovative technologies such as intelligence, sensing, networking, and cloud computing, combined with the new business and new models of the mobile Internet, and provide important means for promoting intelligent life and promoting industrial transformation. Breakthrough.
According to different application fields, service robots can be divided into two categories: personal (home) service robots and commercial service robots. Personal (home) service robots include sweeping robots, mopping robots, window cleaning robots, companion robots, educational robots and leisure and entertainment robots, while commercial robots include meal delivery robots, welcome robots, hotel robots, shopping guide robots, Bank counter robots, inspection robots, etc.
Among many service robots, housework service robots occupy the dominant position. Among them, sweeping robots account for the largest proportion. With the growth of household disposable income and consumption upgrades, more and more young people prefer products with high intelligence. The appearance of sweeping robots liberated the hands of "lazy people" and freed people from heavy housework.
Although sweeping robots started late in our country, they are developing at an alarming speed. Under the dual wave of consumption upgrades and product intelligence, consumers' rigid demand for machines to replace housework (lazy economy) has become more and more significant.
At present, sweeping robots have undergone the transformation from the first generation of random to the second generation of inertial navigation and the third generation of autonomous navigation. Random products have a poor user experience, leading to situations where they do not want to use them after use. Frequent use of inertial navigation Increase, and the frequency of use of the current new generation of autonomous navigation sweepers has increased significantly.
In addition to home sweeping robots, service robots such as catering and hotels are becoming more common in commercial use. It is understood that with the aging of the population and the decline in the birth rate, there will be a huge labor gap in the next 10 years or so, and labor costs will remain high. It is expected that in 2030, China will become a country with a large labor gap. In this case, the repetitive rate of work needs to be replaced by more productive methods, and the use of robots to replace manual labor is undoubtedly the best choice.
In 2015, a large number of food delivery robots also emerged, but at that time, the robots needed to lay ground magnetic tracks, and the delivery speed was slow and the efficiency was low, even lower than that of ordinary employees without training. Such a robot is obviously not an ideal product in the minds of customers, and has even been called "artificial mental retardation" by industry insiders.
On the other hand, it is the industry's misunderstanding of the market's rigid demand that causes the product to fall into the predicament of "greed for everything. For example, welcoming robots must have functions such as voice interaction and body movements, but also show abilities in face recognition and entertainment interaction. It seems that the more functions, the more they can meet the needs of customers. The result is often Everything is loose". Not only did it fail to do a good job of stability in a single function, but it brought a greater cost burden to the market. The price of tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of robots, as well as the high maintenance costs in the later stages, have discouraged customers from robot products.
It is precisely because of the industry's misunderstanding and misunderstanding of the market's rigid demand that these past robot products are not only eliminated, but also lowered the overall expectations of the market and capital for the robot industry. At present, many robot companies have re-understood the pain points of the industry, and have developed robot products that truly meet market needs and have mature business models. This has greatly changed the inherent impression of catering service robots that was flashy.
After nearly 5 years of baptism, some service robots on the market are becoming more and more intelligent. Take smart walking as an example. At present, most service robots can achieve autonomous walking, autonomous path planning, autonomous obstacle avoidance, etc. Function, even in various complex environments, it can shuttle freely. Of course, behind the realization of autonomous robot walking is a group of leading high-tech companies like Silan Technology, who have made tremendous efforts in the field of robot positioning and navigation.