China dreams of electric sheep at robot conference
— In a martial artist’s white silk pyjamas, a man practiced tai-chi in harmony with a motorized arm at a Beijing exhibition showcasing a vision of robots with Chinese characteristics.
Vehicles with automated gun turrets sat alongside drink-serving karaoke machines at the World Robot Conference, as manufacturers sought new buyers for their “jiqiren” — “machine people” in Chinese.
The push has support at the highest levels of government. President Xi Jinping issued a letter of congratulations for the conference, and the industry is name-checked in the draft version of the country’s new five-year plan, the policy document that guides national economic development.
The world’s second-largest economy is already the leading market for industrial robots, accounting for a quarter of global sales, according to the International Federation of Robotics. But executives at a conference roundtable said the real market opportunity was in service robots for the homes and offices of the world’s most populous country. “There are now less than 100,000 robots in Chinese families, not including vacuum cleaners,” said Liu Xuenan, chief executive officer of Canbot.
In the future, said Yu Kai, the head of Horizon Robotics, China’s automated helpers will do everything from building cars to driving them, predicting that “each person might have 10 robots” — nearly 14 billion potential tin men at current population levels.
Planet of the Apps
Robots have captured China’s imagination. From Transformers to Baymax, the star of Disney’s movie “Big Hero 6,” Chinese consumers have embraced robot heroes, spending hundreds of millions on related movies and merchandise.
In Chinese cities, businesses try to attract customers with robot waiters, cooks, and concierges. In the countryside, rural Da Vincis cobble together mechanical men from scrapyard junk.
A panel at the conference struggled with the question of how China would deal with the rise of artificially intelligent machines.
But the transition from the world of fantasy and novelty to a real robot economy could be tricky, with the country’s technology still lagging far behind neighbors Korea and Japan, the undisputed king of the robots.
China should have more realistic expectations for the near future, said Pinpin Zhu, president of China’s voice controlled service Xiao I Robot, which was involved in a patent dispute with American tech giant Apple linked to its personal digital assistant Siri.
The country may descend from the peak of high expectations into a “trough of disillusionment,” said Zhu, who believes a smartphone-based “Planet of the Apps” is more likely than a world served by humanoid robots.