New entry to the trillion-yuan robot market: The Lifeline Project initiates intelligent breakthrough

The upgrade of "Made in China" is stuck in the core process of vital projects.

Data from third - party research institutions shows that the automation penetration rate in domestic welding scenarios is only about 30%. Welding, however, is the core underlying process that runs through many infrastructure projects such as shipbuilding, energy and power, rail transit, and steel - structure buildings, determining the forming and safety of structures.

This is an anti - common - sense scenario in the wave of intelligentization: in the key projects that support the country's energy transportation and public transportation systems, the automation level has long remained low, and the core processes still mainly rely on manual labor.

The root cause of this situation is the complex and changeable operating environment. Infrastructure construction often involves extreme working conditions such as high temperature and high pressure, and non - standard parts and complex structures are common. This places much higher requirements on the robot's perception system, motion control, and hardware technology than in conventional industrial scenarios.

In the past decade, there is no doubt that the intelligentization of China's manufacturing industry has achieved many breakthroughs on the production side. This is intuitively reflected in the application of CNC machine tools and industrial robots on factory production lines. However, in vital projects where large structural parts and extreme working conditions are intertwined, the boundary of automation has not been truly crossed.

Therefore, the intelligentization of vital projects is not only the "last mile" that industrial automation urgently needs to complete, but also the ultimate "touchstone" to test whether China's intelligent manufacturing system can handle complex scenarios and achieve a higher level of automation.

The "Last Mile" of the Intelligentization Race

The "last mile" describes both the criticality and the challenges of realizing the intelligentization of the core processes in vital projects.

As the core process in vital projects, welding has long faced problems such as high - risk working environments, a shortage of workers, and soaring costs. Academician Pan Jiluan, a leading figure in Chinese welding, once described a heavy - industry construction scenario he witnessed: when welding large - diameter alloy steel tanks, to meet the process quality requirements, the tank walls over a hundred millimeters thick need to be pre - heated to about 200°C. Workers have to wear thick asbestos suits and enter the high - temperature, enclosed tanks through hoisting equipment to carry out operations. In such an environment with extremely high temperatures, limited ventilation, and a tendency to accumulate harmful gases, even if the operation time is only about ten minutes, a medical team must be on standby at the scene throughout.

Accompanying the harsh working environment is a shortage of labor. Third - party data shows that by 2025, there will be a shortage of more than 5 million welders nationwide. According to a survey by a statistical agency, less than 7% of young people are willing to engage in welding work, which will further exacerbate the future shortage of welders. It is estimated that by 2035, the shortage of welders will expand to 10 million. The long - term imbalance between supply and demand in the market has further led to a sharp rise in labor costs. In fact, as early as 2015, the "Made in China 2025" plan pointed out that the continuous increase in the cost of production factors such as labor has become one of the important reasons restricting the development of China's manufacturing industry.

This cycle of high risk, high cost, and low efficiency reflects the structural short - board of "Made in China" in the most basic aspects. On one hand, there is a rigid demand for project safety; on the other hand, there are real constraints caused by labor shortages and rising costs. In this situation, "replacing humans with machines" is not just an added bonus but an urgent and inevitable choice, highlighting the criticality of realizing the intelligentization of the core processes in infrastructure projects.

The challenge lies in that the complex operating environment and the non - standard shapes of structural parts pose numerous obstacles to the application of robots in core processes.

Firstly, the workpieces involved in infrastructure projects are often large in size and complex in structure. For example, the storage tanks in the petrochemical industry can have a diameter of up to one hundred meters, and their wall thickness is beyond that of conventional devices. Bridge steel structures are full of various curved surfaces and criss - crossing components. The larger the workpiece size and the more complex the geometric shape, the higher the requirements for the robot's movement range and flexibility.

Meanwhile, the non - standard parts commonly found in large - scale infrastructure construction make it difficult for automation systems to operate based on fixed trajectories or templates, which greatly increases the difficulty of large - scale implementation of robots.

In addition, large - scale infrastructure construction generally involves complex and extreme working conditions such as high temperature and high humidity. In the nuclear power field, there may even be interference from radiation and toxic gases, causing the core components of robots such as optical sensors to malfunction and the overall performance of the equipment to decline.

More importantly, these challenges almost run through the entire manufacturing foundation of vital projects. Therefore, when intelligentization breakthroughs are achieved in key processes such as welding, the significance goes far beyond the improvement of safety and efficiency in a single link. It means the realization of a closed - loop of the overall automation ability of the manufacturing industry, and ultimately, the value of this ability will spread and extend along the entire manufacturing chain. It can be said that if this "last mile" cannot be completed, there will always be a gap in the overall upgrade of "Made in China".

Difficult Exploration in the "No - Man's Land"

In fact, the improvement of intelligentization under extreme working conditions is a common problem faced by the global manufacturing industry. In this "no - man's land" where automation ability has not yet reached, different countries and enterprises are exploring their own ways to break the deadlock.

In Japan and South Korea, where the automation level of the heavy manufacturing industry is relatively higher, the shipbuilding and steel - structure industries introduced gantry - type welding production lines at an earlier stage for the automated welding of large - area panels. In addition, six - axis welding robotic arms are also widely used in the welding of structural parts to handle welding work in narrow spaces. However, the smooth operation of these solutions is based on a high degree of modular production and high uniformity of component paradigms, so they face significant limitations in terms of reusability and scenario expansion.

Robot companies in Europe and the United States focus on developing crawling or adsorption - type robots that can operate in dangerous environments. A typical example is the magnetic adsorption robot of Gecko Robotics in the United States, which has recently attracted high attention both within and outside the industry. However, most of the solutions of these companies focus on inspection rather than construction, and they have limited ability in autonomous construction in key processes such as welding and cutting.

It is worth mentioning that Gecko is also trying to expand the ability boundary of its robot products, such as performing autonomous maintenance and additive - subtractive manufacturing. However, there is still a long way to go for the robot products of such manufacturers to fully undertake construction tasks.

Domestically, in the face of the shortage of labor and the requirements for safe production, some large central enterprises and leading manufacturers are accelerating the pilot projects of "replacing humans with machines" in bridge, pipeline, and steel - structure construction. For example, CCCC Second Harbor Engineering Co., Ltd. and China Railway Construction Bridge Engineering Bureau Group Co., Ltd. are using intelligent welding as a breakthrough point to improve the automation and intelligentization of the overall construction process.

However, overall, the debugging, operation, and maintenance of robots and their adaptation to the environment are still in the early exploration stage, and more operation experience needs to be accumulated to improve stability. At the same time, the relatively high purchase cost of robot equipment also limits the large - scale penetration of automation systems in infrastructure construction.

Feng Xiaobing, the founder of Boqing Technology, summarized for reporters that the fact that different solutions face their own bottlenecks confirms that the intelligent leap in core processes requires not only breakthroughs in single - point technologies but also the establishment of systematic capabilities.

"Firstly, in terms of perception, to enable robots to accurately identify the position of welds in high - temperature, strong - light, and complex - structure environments, the perception system needs to be reconstructed. Secondly, in terms of decision - making, in the face of non - standard structures, the path - planning and motion - control algorithms of robots must have stronger coordination and self - adaptation abilities. Thirdly, in terms of control, the body structure needs to find a balance between stiffness and flexibility, so that robots can achieve stable autonomous operations in complex spaces. Finally, in terms of deployment, enabling robots to be used quickly without teaching and across different scenarios is a decisive step for large - scale application."

Boqing Technology is also a robot company focusing on the intelligentization of basic processes. Its origin can be traced back to the prototype of the trackless full - position crawling welding robot developed by the team of Academician Pan Jiluan of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1997. In 2017, Feng Xiaobing, the last disciple of Academician Pan Jiluan, inherited the technology from his tutor and established Boqing Technology as a commercial entity, thus starting the exploration of the industrialization of scientific research achievements with this prototype as the entry point.

As one of the many enterprises trying to conquer this intelligent "no - man's land", Boqing Technology has explored a unique systematic solution in the past eight years. Firstly, in terms of the ability to handle complex scenarios, Boqing Technology chose to build an "intelligent welding center" for pre - simulation, aiming to improve the robot's adaptability in actual operation scenarios.

Then, it reconstructed the visual sensing system. Boqing Technology independently developed laser vision sensors and molten - pool vision sensors suitable for extreme working conditions such as welding, enabling robots to stably identify the three - dimensional contour position of welds and the dynamic state of the molten pool in an operating environment with strong light and strong electromagnetic interference, fundamentally solving the interference of the external environment on the robot's autonomous operation.

In terms of control, Boqing Technology adopted an autonomous movement solution with a non - fixed coordinate framework. As a result, robots can directly adsorb on the surface of workpieces and crawl freely without relying on tracks or fixed workstations. They can also independently search for and track welds during the movement process, adapting to the complex spatial structures common in large - scale infrastructure construction.

From the reconstruction of the perception system, control, to the process, the foundation of the intelligent solution for core processes has actually been established.

The Inflection Point of the Trillion - Dollar Blue - Ocean Market is Approaching

Currently, Boqing Technology's solution has been successfully implemented in multiple actual scenarios, and it has even provided a solution that better addresses the current pain points in the Japanese and South Korean markets, where the automation rate is higher.

As early as 2023, Boqing Technology reached a cooperation agreement with Okaya Steel Works, a large Japanese trading and engineering company, for the export of welding robots, and exported its core product, the trackless full - position crawling welding robot, to Japan. This highly flexible solution addresses two of the most urgent pain points in the Japanese and South Korean markets: the narrow spaces and on - site welding tasks that traditional fixed - type equipment cannot cover need new - type mobile welding robots to fill the gap; the continuous shortage of labor also requires robot solutions with cross - scenario application capabilities to break the deadlock.

Judging from the verification results, the welding joints of Boqing Technology's robots passed the X - ray flaw detection test 100%, fully meeting the highest - level acceptance standards. This means that the higher environmental adaptability and structural matching degree brought about by technological breakthroughs and engineering capabilities have enabled the domestic intelligent solution for core processes to be exported back to overseas markets with a higher automation rate.

In 2024, Boqing Technology achieved profitability. That is to say, Boqing Technology's automation solution has also been successfully implemented at the levels of the company's own business model and financial structure. This is rare in the robot industry, which is currently in the limelight. Most robot companies still need to rely on financing to maintain R & D and operations, and their commercialization path is still long.

From an industry perspective, this means that the intelligentization of the core processes of vital projects is moving from being technically feasible to being commercially feasible at the same time. This is determined on one hand by the reusability of solutions brought about by the commonality of technical challenges in basic processes, and on the other hand by the huge investment involved in vital projects themselves.

Currently, most solutions for improving the automation of infrastructure construction target welding, which accounts for a relatively large proportion of the processes. Once the welding automation solution is fully implemented, the technology and engineering capabilities can be further extended to other processes such as cutting, back - gouging, and assembly.

In terms of the reusability of technology and solutions, Boqing Technology's practice provides an observable sample. According to Boqing, as of now, the company has launched robot products for other processes such as back - gouging. Feng Xiaobing told reporters that the extension between processes is essentially an amplification of the system's capabilities. "As long as the underlying capabilities such as perception are solid, the solution can be reused in more process scenarios."

Meanwhile, the market space is not only reflected in the direct sales of robot bodies and supporting equipment but also in the systematic product chain including the entire set of solutions and operation and maintenance services. Boqing Technology has currently formed a diversified product matrix consisting of robot bodies, robot workstations, intelligent perception sensors, and intelligent welding software.

The capital - intensive nature of vital projects further exponentially amplifies this large - scale imagination space. Based on the statistical data of the past few years, the total annual construction investment scale in the four major fields of shipbuilding, petrochemical, rail transit, and nuclear power is about 4 trillion yuan. In the construction and manufacturing processes of these fields, there are still many tasks that rely on manual labor. This means that the promotion of "replacing humans with machines" breeds a trillion - dollar market.

Currently, the policy side is making efforts to accelerate the "replacement of humans with machines" in vital projects. As early as the end of 2023, the "Action Plan for the Green Development of the Shipbuilding Industry (2024 - 2030)" emphasized the direction of promoting the green and intelligent development of the shipbuilding industry. The "Implementation Plan for Promoting Equipment Upgrades in the Industrial Field" issued in March this year further clarified that by 2027, the equipment investment scale in the industrial field will increase by more than 25% compared with that in 2023.

The combination of policy support and the technological breakthroughs and commercial success represented by companies like Boqing Technology makes the inflection point of this trillion - dollar blue - ocean market closer and closer.

The Key to Opening the "Next Industrial Intelligentization Entrance"

As the industrial inflection point approaches, new variables are emerging. The real - working - condition data collected in high - risk and non - standard environments is high - quality nourishment for the continuous learning of industrial intelligent systems. The industrial - grade large models trained in this way will further empower the autonomous decision - making of machines in the entire manufacturing chain.

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