One robot per 10 workers

ScienceDaily (Oct. 21, 2004)

The report was produced for a conference at the UN complex in Geneva today called "A Robot in Every Home?" accompanied by a robot exhibition on the lawn there.

"Falling or stable robot prices, increasing labour costs and continuously improved technology are major driving forces which speak for continued massive robot investment in industry," says Jan Karlsson, who is responsible for the annual survey.

Right now Japan uses about 320 robots of all sorts per 10,000 employees, while Germany uses 148 industrial robots per 10,000 robots, Italy 116, Sweden 99 and between 50 and 80 each in the United States, Finland, France, Spain, Austria, Denmark and Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg.

In the car industry, there is one robot per 10 workers in Japan, Italy and Germany, it says.

Among the service robots, "medical robots, underwater robots, surveillance robots, demolition robots and many other types of robots for carrying out a multitude of tasks are doing very well," the report says.

In the long run, service robots will be everyday tools for mankind, the ECE and IFR say. "They will not only clean our floors, mow our lawns and guard our homes but they will also assist old and handicapped people with sophisticated interactive equipment, carry out surgery, inspect pipes and sites that are hazardous to people, fight fire and bombs and be used in many other applications."