Why are home appliance giants all targeting robots?

Once upon a time, home appliance giants built their "empires" with traditional home appliances such as air conditioners, refrigerators, and washing machines. Now, they have all joined the brand - new robotics track, trying to carve out a new world outside the home appliance market with slowing growth.

However, can these traditional home appliance giants achieve their goals?

Home Appliance Giants Flock to Robotics

Nowadays, in the path of home appliance enterprises to open up "new battlefields", AI and robotics are the hottest areas. Traditional giants like Midea Group and Haier, as well as cross - border players like Xiaomi, almost all regard the robotics field as an important direction for transformation.

However, behind this upsurge lies the common growth anxiety dilemma of home appliance enterprises.

The current large home appliance market has long entered the stage of stock competition. The replacement cycle of products such as refrigerators and air conditioners is generally as long as five to ten years, leaving less and less incremental market space for enterprises. Moreover, there have been an increasing number of cross - border and emerging home appliance brands in recent years.

Data from the National Bureau of Statistics shows that in 2024, the cumulative main business income of China's home appliance industry was 1.95 trillion yuan, a year - on - year increase of 5.6%. But in fact, this is also due to the short - term stimulation of consumption demand by policies such as national subsidies and trade - in programs. In the long run, although the industry is growing, the growth pressure is obvious - for example, the cycle laws of various industrial lines are different, the "price war" is fierce, and consumers' consumption desire is not high. Some industry insiders even claim that the home appliance industry has become the most competitive one.

In contrast, the robotics industry presents a different picture. According to CCTV.com, in the first half of this year, the production of industrial robots and service robots in China increased by 35.6% and 25.5% year - on - year respectively. As of now, there are more than 930,000 robotics - related enterprises in China. Among them, more than 100,000 new related enterprises were added in the first half of this year, a year - on - year increase of about 45% compared with the same period in 2024.

Facing the stagnant red - ocean market and the rapidly expanding blue - ocean market, robotics naturally becomes the new target of home appliance enterprises.

Coincidentally, there are some commonalities in the underlying technical logic between robotics and home appliances. For example, the sensors and AI algorithms required by some robots belong to the same intelligent hardware technology system as the intelligent control and frequency conversion technology of home appliance products. The technical foundation accumulated by home appliance enterprises over the years can be reused.

Therefore, home appliance enterprises with limited growth space have to turn to new sources, and the robotics field happens to be the seemingly fertile low - lying land.

However, the path for home appliance giants to enter the robotics industry is not smooth.

Home Appliance Giants Face Their Own Challenges

Midea Group's exploration in the robotics field can be traced back to 2017. In that year, Midea Group successively acquired German robotics company KUKA and Israeli servo system company Servotronix, thus officially entering the industrial robotics and automation market. In 2022, Midea Group successfully completed the full acquisition and privatization process of KUKA.

Source: Company Announcement

Source: Company Announcement

When Midea Group spent a huge amount of money to acquire KUKA, the outside world generally expected that Midea Group could master the core technology of industrial robots and quickly enter the high - end market. However, from the actual performance, the effect of this technological alliance did not meet expectations.

Midea Group's 2024 annual report shows that Midea Group's overall performance was outstanding, with an operating income of 409.08 billion yuan, a year - on - year increase of 9.4%; and a net profit attributable to the parent company of 38.53 billion yuan, a year - on - year increase of 14.2%. However, the annual income of its robotics and automation business was 28.7 billion yuan, accounting for only 7.05% of the total revenue, a year - on - year decrease of 7.58%, and the gross profit margin decreased by 1.7 percentage points year - on - year.

Midea Group explained that affected by the cyclical fluctuations of industry demand, such as the slowdown in the growth of global new energy vehicles and the capacity adjustment of the photovoltaic and lithium - battery industries, the short - term demand in the industrial robotics market was under pressure, resulting in a decline in the business income.

KUKA's performance has been volatile. Its revenue continued to decline from 2017 to 2020, and it even suffered a loss of 100 million euros in 2020, dragging down the overall robotics business revenue of Midea Group. Even though its performance improved after 2021 and its market share in the domestic market increased to 8.2% in 2024, its growth momentum was still weak compared with local brands such as Estun and Inovance Technology.

Although Midea Group has continuously increased its R & D investment, with a cumulative investment of more than 65 billion yuan in the past five years, including more than 16 billion yuan in 2024, the performance fluctuations of KUKA after the acquisition still arouse the outside world's doubts about the sustainability of Midea Group's robotics strategy.

Among several home appliance giants, Gree's robotics layout is obviously lagging behind. Although Gree launched its robotics business as early as 2017, its robotics business is currently concentrated in the industrial field and is mainly for self - use, with a very low proportion of external sales. In terms of performance, in the first half of 2025, the income of Gree's intelligent equipment segment was only 314 million yuan, accounting for 0.32% of the total revenue in the same period.

Source: Company Announcement

Gree claims to have mastered the core technologies of drivers and reducers and achieved full coverage of robots with a load of 1kg - 600kg, but its market presence is still weak. MIR data shows that in 2024, Gree did not make it into the top ten in the domestic industrial robot market or the personal/home service robot market share rankings.

At the same time, there are no representative Gree products in popular consumer - grade market categories such as sweeping robots and window - cleaning robots. Analysts believe that Gree has failed to keep up with the pace of intelligent transformation and has fallen behind its peers in the robotics track.

Compared with Midea Group and Gree, which focus on the industrial field, Haier focuses more on the home service robot market. Through means such as acquiring Qingdao Taber Robotics and cooperating with Leju Robotics, Haier Smart Home has continuously expanded its exploration in the robotics field and exhibited the first domestic general - purpose service humanoid robot "Kuafu" for home scenarios this year.

Recently, Haier also launched the "HIVA Haiwa" home robot. This robot is 165 cm tall and weighs 70 kg, and it is claimed to be able to perform various household tasks with 44 degrees of freedom.

However, there is a gap between the ideal and the reality. According to public information, the current state of "HIVA Haiwa" is actually remotely controlled by engineers and cannot complete tasks independently.

In the promotional GIFs, Haiwa can run, turn, use a floor - cleaning machine, cook, and even interact intelligently with the washing machine to help fold and pick up clothes. These scenarios seem real, but currently this "housework terminator" is just a remotely - controlled actor, and it can do very few tasks independently.

Of course, the home service robot market does have great potential. The latest data from the State Taxation Administration shows that the sales of smart home products grew rapidly in the first three quarters. For example, the sales revenue of service - consumption robot manufacturing such as sweeping robots increased by 75% year - on - year. But a real household robot needs to solve the three major problems of "perception", "decision - making", and "action". For Haier to really open up the market, it needs to solve the technical bottlenecks.

At present, many enterprises are still "imitating in various ways" and showing "seemingly dazzling actions". The ability of robots to independently handle the complex home environment still needs to be broken through.

Conclusion

Generally speaking, home appliance enterprises face some common challenges when entering the robotics field. The robotics industry emphasizes high - technology and high - craftsmanship and requires long - term accumulation. It is almost impossible to achieve quick success. Moreover, this new industry, which is "asset - intensive, technology - intensive, and ecosystem - intensive", is definitely not an industry that ordinary home appliance enterprises can easily enter.

However, the high threshold also determines that this can only be a game for a few giants. The profitability of the robotics industry far exceeds the imagination of the current home appliance industry. Some industry insiders point out that compared with other consumer electronics industries, the home appliance industry has a large scale and a high degree of standardization. It is most likely to become the next industry to widely use robots after the automotive industry.

The robotics track is both full of temptations and thorns. Whether the robotics dreams of home appliance giants can come true still needs more time to polish.

This article is from the WeChat public account "Chief Consumer Officer", author: Hasove, published by 36Kr with authorization.