However, robot manufacture is already quite a success story in Europe. It is an innovation-driven and export-oriented industry, worth today about €3.1bn (£2.1bn) annually in robots and as much as €10bn in robot components, system integration and other services. This has been gradually established over the last 25 years and now accounts for about 35 percent of the global industry — long established companies are now being joined by an increasing number of start-up companies.
Research into robotics is also very active. It is estimated that about 250 universities and research institutes around the EU are currently working in this area. Research networks such as EURON and professional organisations such as EUnited Robotics are also helping to improve the coordination of European research and innovation-related activities.
€50m annually on robotics
However, although the EU spends
around €50m annually on robotics related research, it does not yet have
a common platform for its R&D efforts. In Japan, on the other hand,
the Japanese Robot Association (JARA) has launched robotics initiatives
worth $300m and in Korea, government and industry are in the progress
of setting up a 10-year strategic robotics research programme worth
$1bn.
The ASIMO humanoid robot from Honda
"The difference between the Japanese approach to developing robotics and the European one is," says BARA's Young, "is the fact that they have a product focus, whereas the Europeans, the UK in particular, have a technology focus. The technology focus means that bits are developed without developing the complete system. These bits may be very good but they are useless unless they are assembled into a product". This view is underlined by the fact that both the Korean and Japanese programmes are part of much larger, national roadmaps that are aimed towards gaining a competitive edge in a critical area of technology — an area which both countries see as vital for the future of all their manufacturing industries.
This, says Young, is the problem with the UK. "The trouble is that there is no political commitment to robotics in the UK. The government...
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