How long can highly sought after humanoid robots enter homes? Industry insiders: It may take another 20-30 years to wait

For over half a century, there have been various literary and film works written in the future that showcase people's imagination and exploration of humanoid robots entering family life.

In 1950, Turing proposed in his open paper "Computers and Intelligence" that machines can interact with the environment like humans, perceive their surroundings, plan, make decisions, and act autonomously, and have the ability to execute these decisions; The classic science fiction film "Blade Runner 2049" released in 2017 depicts the story of love and murder between the replicant K and the bionic robot.

In the real world, manufacturing humanoid robots is also the ultimate dream of countless engineers. In 2023, with the rise of artificial intelligence, humanoid robots will once again become popular in the technology industry.

In July of this year, unicorn Data Robotics Co., Ltd. in the field of intelligent robots in China announced the launch of the robot multimodal large model RobotGPT, and in August, it released a bipedal universal humanoid robot.

Data robot.

At the same time, the humanoid robot "Expedition AI" developed by Zhi Huijun, a highly regarded technology self media blogger and once known as Huawei's genius boy, made its debut on August 18th.

Along with its popularity, the controversy between humanoid robot technology and ethics has also attracted people's attention. How long will it take for humanoid robots to enter thousands of households? Some employees said in an interview with Pengpai Technology that they may wait another 20-30 years, but it may also be difficult to say.

Why did humanoid robots become popular again? Technological breakthroughs open up market imagination space

Yang Dong has been working in the field of industrial robots for over 20 years and has clearly felt that in the past two to three months, the domestic market has shown a very high enthusiasm for humanoid robots. He believes that the reason for the popularity of humanoid robots is inseparable from the key breakthroughs in technology. Previously, the first generation of "internet celebrity" humanoid robot ASIMO went from being popular to announcing the termination of research and development in 2018, mainly due to the inability to break through in technology. "Stuck in technology or remote control, robots do not have autonomous capabilities. In addition, commercialization cannot be achieved and there are no practical scenarios.".

In 2021, Tesla announced the Optimus Optimus Optimus humanoid robot, and in 2023, Boston Dynamics released a humanoid robot, showing people that humanoid robots have strong artificial characteristics.

Tesla Optimus Optimus Optimus humanoid robot.

In addition, since the beginning of this year, the popularity of AI models such as chatGPT has greatly reduced the cost of AI applications, making it possible for robots to have a certain level of intelligence.

In the eyes of Hu Yu, a technology enthusiast and columnist in the field of artificial intelligence, the emergence of ChatGpt has ignited the popularity of humanoid robots, "because this is a crucial breakthrough in robot technology, and a breakthrough in the ability of automation to intelligence."

Hu Yu said that in the past, people only saw automated robots, which could start operating service activities such as brewing coffee by inputting instructions to the robots. However, these robots do not have a certain degree of autonomy, let alone independent decision-making.

"The new generation of large models and artificial intelligence technology models have enabled robots to make breakthroughs in various scenarios, enabling them to make independent judgments and solve problems independently in different application scenarios. This is a qualitative leap," said Hu Yu.

The breakthroughs in robot joint hardware and the development of AI artificial intelligence have brought about a revolution in human-computer communication. People are beginning to believe that humanoid robots may enter life scenarios in the future, and may arrive faster than expected.

"It is a highly anticipated event, which is likely to be a new industry that could disrupt market size and space," Cao Wei, a partner at Lanchi Venture Capital, told Pengpai Technology.

As an early technology investment institution, Lanchi Venture Capital has been focusing on the robotics track since 2014, investing in robotics projects including Gaoxian Robotics, Uai Zhihe, and Lanxin Technology in the early stages.

Cao Wei's analysis suggests that the reason behind the popularity of humanoid robots is due to their large imagination and market space.

Musk once proposed a bold idea at a shareholder meeting, "Everyone should have two humanoid robots. In the future, the number of humanoid robots worldwide is expected to reach 10 to 20 billion."

Cao Wei said that Musk mentioned a very long-term vision. Specifically landing in the vertical field will be a very large market.

In addition, Cao Wei analyzed that driven by the variable changes in the large model, people have seen that the software and hardware of humanoid robots are constantly iterating and optimizing rapidly, which makes the possibility and speed of the entire robot landing worth looking forward to.

As an investor, Cao Wei candidly stated that humanoid robots are currently a promising investment project for them. He believes that in the next two to three years, China's service robots and industrial robots will sweep across the world.

"The current competition is still only in the laboratory stage"

Pengpai Technology has noticed that humanoid robots, which have received high attention from the outside world, are currently accelerating their landing as emerging technological products.

However, many industry interviewees pointed out a common issue in an interview with Pengpai Technology. Although the concept of humanoid robots has become popular, the technology of humanoid robots born in the market is still in its early stages, and commercial production has not yet been achieved.

"At present, there is no robot on the market that has achieved mass production, and the competition is only in the stage of developing new products in the laboratory and releasing them to the public." Zhang Yu, a PR personnel of a leading unicorn robot company in China, told Pengpai Technology.

Zhang Yu candidly stated that the most crucial factor in achieving mass production is sufficient financial support, which requires institutions and enterprises to continuously invest money in the research and development of humanoid robots. At the same time, it allows for the inability to produce market-oriented products in the short term, which often involves high research and development costs. "Humanoid robots are the most money burning industry in the field of artificial intelligence, and it may be difficult for the capital market to invest 10 billion yuan in the short term to produce products and technologies."

Musk revealed on July 20th that although the demand for production of Tesla's humanoid robot Optimus is considerable, there are still many challenges in mass production, such as the lack of suppliers producing the actuators required for Optimus, which must be customized and require a certain period of time.

Cao Wei believes that from the perspective of technical capabilities and reserves, it is possible to achieve mass production domestically, but it requires a certain time cycle. "It is already an ideal state for the companies we invest in to enter a rapid commercialization stage within 3 to 5 years; it takes at least 10 years to truly form a mass production scale," Cao Wei said.

Humans always expect humanoid robots to enter thousands of households and serve us meticulously. They are moving towards real-life application scenarios and have always become the common expectation of capital, technology, and the market. In the eyes of practitioners, the functions displayed by humanoid robots in the current market are still far from the ideal "home nanny".

In Zhang Yu's view, the most difficult step in promoting robots to practical application scenarios is in the home setting. At present, the scenarios where robots are relatively easy to land are concentrated in more standardized scenarios, such as factory offices, property management, etc. For example, the first application scenario for Musk's humanoid robot was set in factories and offices, as the environment is relatively fixed and does not undergo significant changes. However, compared to fixed scenarios such as factories and offices, home scenes are the least standardized. The less standardized it is, the higher the requirements for the hardware and software of robots.

Numerous industry insiders and technical experts interviewed believe that humanoid robots, when fully integrated into society, still face many safety issues that need to be urgently addressed.

Cao Wei believes that currently, China cannot be said to have entered the era of humanoid robots, but rather the era of general-purpose robots. Cao Wei said that the development of robots has gone through the stages of industrial robots, collaborative robots, and general-purpose robots. Although general-purpose robots may not necessarily have humanoid shapes, they can solve various types of tasks. And from general-purpose machines to humanoid robots, the universal ability of intermediate robots is a crucial step. In the future, when humanoid robots or general-purpose robots enter human home life, special attention should be paid to the material aspect. What if a child in the family accidentally falls onto a robot while running and gets injured?

Yang Jian expressed concerns from a technical perspective, pointing out that humanoid robots have high requirements for controlling safety circuits. If the robot is at home, it cannot guarantee what kind of problems will occur. "Safety is not limited to the safety of interacting with humans, but also needs to be taken seriously when humanoid robots can accept external signals and make independent judgments."

Will the popularity of humanoid robots be influenced by capital and ultimately just a flash in the pan? Can humans wait for humanoid robots to enter the scene of life in their lifetime?

Yuan Jianjun stated that excessive pursuit of humanoid robots in the short term is detrimental to the development of the industry, as it is a long-term investment process that takes a long time from inventing prototypes to producing products that can truly integrate into daily life.

From the perspective of technological development, Yang Jian has always maintained a rational attitude towards humanoid robots. He believes that attitude towards humanoid robots should return to rationality, starting with practicing internal skills and doing their best in the laboratory before releasing them.

Zhang Yu believes that perhaps in twenty or thirty years, the day will come, but it's hard to say, "As long as a technology company makes this thing, the entire industry will go up together soon."

"China will definitely have great humanoid robot companies"

Several humanoid robot practitioners and investors also pointed out that the development of the humanoid robot industry requires a "scientific ecosystem" suitable for humanoid robots.

Taking Xiaomi as an example, Zhang Yu analyzed that the CyberOne full-size bionic humanoid robot developed by Xiaomi is more like a product of the natural evolution of Xiaomi's "technology ecosystem" and also a spokesperson for Xiaomi's technology ecosystem.

Since its establishment, Xiaomi has continuously integrated and evolved a technology system that spans from smartphones, wearable devices, smart homes, intelligent manufacturing, smart electric vehicles, and biomimetic robots. The future scenario setting of Xiaomi robots is mainly in the intelligent manufacturing field of Xiaomi factories.

Cao Wei believes that the use of humanoid robots and the creation of a scientific ecosystem cannot be separated from government support. Currently, there are very clear policy guidelines and implementation of humanoid robots in China, which is a good start.

Cao Wei once analyzed and pointed out that from the demand side, aging population is a problem that we must face at present. In recent years, China's population growth has slowed down, and the demographic dividend is not there. In the new situation, artificial intelligence robots can lead humanity to a new level. Especially with the maturity of technology and market education, the types of robots continue to increase and their performance improves, and their application scenarios and scope are further expanding. China has now become the largest robot consumer company.

In addition, from the supply side perspective, Chinese entrepreneurs have an active community, with not only more universities offering robotics engineering majors, more entrepreneurs, and more capital, but also an upstream and downstream ecosystem, which makes product iteration faster than other countries.

From the perspective of the entire scientific ecosystem, "there will definitely be great humanoid robot companies in China in the future," Cao Wei said.

Pengpai Technology has noticed that many domestic governments have successively issued action plans to promote the development of high-level applications of artificial intelligence.

Beijing, Shenzhen, and Shanghai have successively issued industrial support policies. On May 31st, Shenzhen released the "Action Plan for Accelerating the High Quality Development and High Level Application of Artificial Intelligence in Shenzhen", proposing to incubate highly intelligent production robots and accelerate the establishment of the Guangdong Province Humanoid Robot Manufacturing Industry Innovation Center. On June 15th, Shanghai issued the "Three Year Action Plan for Promoting High Quality Development of Manufacturing Industry in Shanghai", aiming at the forefront of artificial intelligence technology, building a universal large model, developing industrial ecology in vertical fields, building an international algorithm innovation base, and accelerating the innovative development of humanoid robots.

In the eyes of Hu Yu, a technology enthusiast and columnist in the field of artificial intelligence, this series of favorable policies indicates that China's first tier cities have created vast market space for the development and application of humanoid robots.

Hu Yu uses the metaphor of tropical rainforest to describe the scientific ecosystem. He believes, "The true scientific ecosystem is a tropical rainforest. Although we cannot predict when the next species will emerge, we always know that there will be species emerging in the rainforest. This is a good scientific ecosystem."