Fifty years ago, the United States became the first country to produce industrial robots. Today these mechanical marvels have stormed into many other areas of our lives.

Simply look at Lego Mindstorms, the world's most popular line of robot tool kits, to understand the growing prominence in not only the tech landscape, but in mainstream application, too. More than one million Lego Mindstorm kits have been sold since their 1998 debut. If that isn't enough, consider Microsoft's announcement in late June that it was launching a development platform for people building robots.

Yet the majority of the world's robots are locked down to an area on a factory floor, doing many of the onerous tasks that people once had to do. Some 160,000 robots are now installed in American factories, as IMT reported in May. In fact, half the robots in the U.S. are still used in manufacturing, whether for heavy lifting, welding, painting, stamping or cutting jobs. The automotive industry, which is the largest customer for robotics, accounts for more than 60 percent of all robot purchases in North America, according to the Robotic Industries Association (RIA).

While new orders for North American robotics took a bit of a hit in the first quarter of 2006, sales of robots to non-automotive industries — such as food, consumer goods, pharmaceuticals and life sciences — increased 10 percent in the same period.

Helping to double the amount of robotics research worldwide in the last three years are cheaper components and advances in computing power. As of last year, the robotic arm business has been nearing a mature state, where they can provide enough speed, accuracy and ease of use for most of the applications. And vision guidance, or machine vision, is bringing more flexibility to robotic cells. Further, robot calibration is increasingly more important in order to guarantee a good positioning accuracy.

Yet the market is still relatively small: $6 billion a year for industrial robots, according to the International Federation of Robots. However, once you include the software, peripherals and systems needed to support robots, the market value jumps to $18 billion.

And growth predictions worldwide are dizzying.

As recent Frost & Sullivan predictions propose, new markets present numerous opportunities for robotics makers in Europe.

Says Frost & Sullivan:

The booming packaging industry specifically in respect to the consumer markets offers immense potential for robotics. Changing product types and varying product volumes necessitate flexible automation solutions. Manufacturers in consumer markets are opening up to the idea of investing in robots to reduce costs and maintain quality, thereby boosting sales of robotics in the packaging market.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and consumer markets such as food and beverage and pharmaceuticals, hold huge potential for robotics in materials handling. Such traditionally conservative (thrifty) industries anticipate that robots will reduce labor costs and manage product line changes along with fluctuating volumes. However, most SMEs cannot afford huge investments in flexible automation, while the need for flexibility is greatest among SMEs that constantly have to cope with changing demands of end users.

Yet according to Assembly magazine's State of the Profession 2006 in early August:

Small companies appear more willing to invest in robots. For example, 35 percent of manufacturers with less than 100 employees plan to use robotics technology during the next 12 months. In sharp contrast, only 32 percent of manufacturers with more than 1,000 employees plan to commit resources to robots, perhaps because they have already made initial investments.

Assembly magazine's survey findings show most assemblers are "optimistic about future investments in capital equipment" such as robotics (and wireless networks). Assemblers plan to implement robotics as well as wireless networks and machine vision to reduce production costs and gain a competitive edge in the marketplace. Robotics is most popular in the plastics and rubber products industry, where 53 percent of respondents claim they will use the technology in their plants during the next 12 months.

Respondents who are using flexible manufacturing to remain competitive plan to invest heavily in robotics. Roland Berger Strategy Consultants says, "manufacturers in the U.S. only use 63 robots per every 10,000 employees versus 148 robots per 10,000 workers in Germany." Those figures pale in comparison to Japan, where there are three times as many robotic applications as in North America.

Joseph Engelberger, known as the Father of Robotics and the first U.S. industrial robot manufacturer, says the U.S. uses and produces fewer robots than Japan or Europe because it relies on less-expensive immigrant labor. And in a 289-page government-funded report this year (via The Philadelphia Inquirer), University of Southern California robotics pioneer George Bekey and other authors found that Japan, South Korea and the European Union all outspend this country on research and development of robots. In the late 1980s, says the report, the U.S. lost its dominance in industrial robots.

Considering the increasing prominence of robots in the mainstream, as well as the continued advancements in industrial robotics, clearly there remain numerous untapped applications for robots in U.S. manufacturing. Rise, robot.

Sources

New Markets Present Unprecedented Opportunities For Robotics Manufacturers
Frost & Sullivan (via PRNewswire/MCADCafe), May 4, 2006

A Brave New World: State of the Profession 2006
by Austin Weber
ASSEMBLY magazine, Aug. 1, 2006

Fighting fire with robots
by Tom Avril
The Philadelphia Inquirer, Aug. 23, 2006