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| Moon Jeon-il, president of Korea Institute for Robot Industry Advancement (KIRIA) / Courtesy of KIRIA |
By Baek Byung-yeul
The robot industry has become a key factor in many countries as robots can help them achieve economic diversification and boost manufacturing efficiency. Korea is also exerting efforts to raise the robot industry as a new growth engine and in 2020 the country will kick it into high gear, said Moon Jeon-il, president of the Korea Institute for Robot Industry Advancement (KIRIA).
"With the advent of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), internet of things (IoT) and fifth-generation (5G) network, the robot industry has become a key subject of the Fourth Industrial Revolution," Moon told The Korea Times during an interview in Seoul, Dec. 24.
"Robots will play a pump-priming role to spur the economic development of Korea, helping local companies improve competitiveness and solve social problems such as labor shortage and care for elderly people."
Korea is making efforts to foster the robot industry with an aim of becoming the world's fourth-largest player by 2023. It also set a goal to nurture 20 major robotics companies and double the number of industrial robots to 700,000 from 320,000 to expand the market size to 15 trillion won ($12.9 billion), currently valued at around 5.7 trillion won, by that year.
"To become a strong robotics player, the government drew up a five-year Third Robot Basic Plan in August. Under the scheme, the government will foster both industrial and service robot sectors and establish a vibrant ecosystem for local robotics companies," Moon said.
Based in Daegu, 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, KIRIA was established in 2011 with an aim to boost the robot industry through various support programs and policies. Moon is the fourth president of the state-run institution.
Embracing the importance of nurturing the robot industry, the government almost doubled KIRIA's budget to 55 billion won in 2020 from 29.7 billion in 2019. Of the total budget, KIRIA will spend about 30 billion won to foster industrial robots, service robots and an ecosystem for the robot business.
"For the industrial robot sector, we will work on distributing industrial robots to companies in manufacturing industries such as welding, fiber and food and beverage, because companies in the sector are struggling with workforce problems. For the service robot sector, we will concentrate on nurturing care robots, wearable robots, exoskeletons and medical robots," he said.
"KIRIA is also devoted to galvanizing the ecosystem for the robot industry. We are offering education programs to companies so they can educate their employees to utilize robots. To become a strong player in the industry, the country needs more than 30,000 robotics professionals within 10 years. As part of our efforts to strengthen the ecosystem, we will expand these programs."
Though Korea lags behind China, Japan, the United States and European nations in terms of software and hardware, the KIRIA chief said the country's robot industry has a rosy outlook given it has the world's highest "robot density" rate.
"Korea's robot industry is estimated at around 5.7 trillion won and has seen an annual growth of 12 percent on average. In terms of the production scale of robots, Korea accounts for about 10 percent, being placed fifth in the world," Moon said.
"However, the outlook is not that bad as the robot industry here is centered on industrial robots and the country has the highest number of industrial robots for every 10,000 people employed in manufacturing, which is 631 as of 2016," he added citing the data provided by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR).
With the government's support plan, he forecasted that the country will be able to nurture major robotics companies that can generate an annual revenue of more than 300 billion won in the near future.
"There will be more star players in the industry while currently Hyundai Robotics is the only company that logs an annual revenue of around 300 billion won and Japan has more than 20 companies that generate a revenue of 500 billion won," he said.
'Japan's export control is a chance for the local robot industry'
Moon said Japan's export curbs on tech materials bound for Korea, starting in July, will help establish a healthy ecosystem for the robot business here despite concerns that the export controls would make Korea companies experience difficulties in conducting business.
Before the export restrictions, Korean firms were reluctant to consider using robots or robotic parts made by local producers. But Moon said local robot companies could benefit from the dispute as the export controls forced buyers to diversify their supply chains.
"Japan's export curbs will become an opportunity for Korean robot companies. To develop a product, there should be a proof procedure between manufacturers and users but robot firms here had not even had a chance to promote their products because Korean firms relied heavily on Japanese products, which are more dependable," Moon said.
"After the export control, however, a growing number of companies are moving to collaborate with local robot companies as they are urged to diversify their supply chains to avoid over-reliance on Japanese companies."
As chief of an institution that plays a mediator role between large companies and robot firms here, Moon said his goal is to upgrade the business capability of small robotics firms to compete with strong players from Europe and Japan.
"Robot companies here have been relying heavily on overseas robot parts makers as the localization rate for Korean robots is less than 50 percent. Our goal is to help those robot makers here enhance their capabilities so that they can be recognized as players that can be compared to strong robot firms from European countries and Japan," he said.
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| Drone maker Joy Drone employees pose with the company's drones at a shared booth set up by the Korea Institute for Robot Industry Advancement during the IFA fair in Berlin, Sept. 6. / Korea Times photo by Baek Byung-yeul |
'KIRIA becomes an incubator for robot startups'
Moon also revealed KIRIA's role is to become a faithful incubator for local startups. Currently 40 startups are based in KIRIA's Daegu headquarters, receiving financial and technical support.
"We are offering a range of benefits to companies based in our headquarters, such as product design and certification. They also can use product manufacturing equipment at a low price," Moon said.
Giving a successful example of a company that grew up in the incubator, Moon mentioned Roboprint, which sells painting robots for exterior walls of buildings and offers robot painting services. The company also painted exterior walls of facilities used for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics.
"Roboprint is one of the most famous among startups that are doing business at our facility. It manufactures painting robots that paint murals on the walls of buildings," he said.
The institution also launched the Korea Robotics Center in Hangzhou, China, in November 2018 to help robot companies make inroads into the international market.
"The purpose of the center is to help small- and medium-sized robot companies, which can't afford setting up overseas branches, to make inroads into Chinese markets. Currently 17 companies are using the space. At the center, those companies are utilizing the space for doing office tasks, displaying their robotics and having meetings with Chinese buyers," he said.
Moon added KIRIA will continue to open overseas offices in Southeast Asia and Europe. "We haven't decided yet which country we will set up the second overseas branch in but we plan to open the second Korea Robotics Center in Southeast Asia in 2020 and third branch in Europe in the future," he said.
To aid the overseas expansion of robot companies here, KIRIA set up promotional booths at the IFA consumer electronics show held in Berlin in September 2018 and the SPS IPC Drivers fair for automation industry held in Nuremberg, Germany, in November 2018.
"Regardless of Japan's export controls, we prepared to set up booths at the international fairs to help promote technologies and products of Korean robot companies. At the exhibitions, we helped the participating firms find buyers," Moon said.
