Industrial Robots down 30% in 2023

    The global economy will continue to have an impact on robot sales, but in the medium term, robotics is perhaps the most important market of all.

    Humanoid robots could very well solve problems in the world, but personally I think it will be a few years before we see market-ready humanoids running around in factories and for example retirement homes.

    Thanks for your input. I am still shocked robot sales down we have entered the robot revolution, we can replace humans on assembly lines, restaurants, etc. It hits virtually every industry and pays for itself. I'm a little worried on the jobless effects on the economy.

    I'm hoping we get humanoid robots sooner, I'm holding off on purchasing more industrial robots and having a real hard time not buying first humanoid robot I can get my hands on. I'm also interested in minibots (half pint humanoid robots capable of light physical work). In some ways I prefer the minibots as they take up less room and less intimidating.

    Well, if you're a manufacturing company, I wouldn't hold back from buying industrial robots. Now you can get them cheaper and faster delivered solutions. In addition, production is not running at full speed, so you can automate production with less stress.

    I haven't even heard of these minibots yet. That sounds exciting too. As long as they are expensive toys, I would hold back. You'll soon get a lot more for your money.

    Given how the DARPA Challenge has gone so far, I'm not holding my breath for humanoids. And even if someone produces a workable model, getting them safety-rated to work around humans "unfenced" is going to be... interesting. Regular robots and AGVs/AMRs can't trip and fall on you, for one thing!

    I hadn't heard that robot sales were down for 2023 -- I certainly haven't seen it on my end of the market (integration). That said, integrators ride the trailing edge of that wave, so it might just be lag.

    I am surprised by the sales numbers, given the manpower crunch all employers seem to be having at the moment. But this might a bit of post-COVID hangover setting in. During the pandemic, there was a huge push to automate everything, and I saw a lot of robots going into businesses that had zero experience or knowledge, at the same time that the skilled-labor pool for integrators was shrinking. A lot of automation was forced into processes where it didn't really fit, or was done poorly by the lower tier of the integration pool, and left a bad taste in some customers' mouths. I also saw automation go into places where no one knew how to maintain it, and the turnover was so high they couldn't keep trained people around, and the management couldn't grasp that they needed to change payscales to keep the necessary talent.

    And even where it worked well (a few medical suppliers I can think of who went gonzo for automation and had great success), the big rush couldn't last forever. We're probably seeing most of the customer base step back to take a breath and reassess.

    Especially with the economic and geopolitical uncertainty in the world right now. There's a definite retrenchment towards reducing spending, and like most capital equipment, automation has some hefty startup costs.

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