"Reducing Labor Costs and Improving Productivity in Small and Medium Manufacturing Enterprises with Collaborative Robots"

Korea International Trade Association International Trade and Commerce Research Institute, Report on 'Collaborative Robots: The Starting Point of Smart Manufacturing for SMEs'

On the 10th, a hand drip robot was brewing coffee at a booth during the 20th Seoul Cafe Show held at COEX in Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Heung-soon] In the post-COVID-19 era, manufacturing companies face the challenge of reducing labor costs, improving productivity, and ensuring employee safety, and there is a claim that 'collaborative robots' can be the solution.

In the report titled "Collaborative Robots: The Starting Point of Smart Manufacturing for Small and Medium Enterprises," released on the 17th by the Korea International Trade Association's Institute for International Trade and Commerce, it was emphasized that small and medium manufacturing enterprises should focus on collaborative robots as a practical alternative to gradually achieve production efficiency and flexibility and transition to smart manufacturing.

Collaborative robots are a type of industrial robot, but unlike traditional industrial robots, they can be used in the same space as humans without protective devices such as safety fences and have excellent safety. The report explained that they are small in size, making process rearrangement easy and operation convenient, allowing for rapid changes in product design and processes. Furthermore, the cost is about 25-30% of traditional industrial robots (20 million to 60 million KRW per unit), making them suitable for small and medium enterprises with limited capital to promote smart manufacturing.

According to the report, many domestic small and medium enterprises currently face difficulties in promoting smart manufacturing due to lack of system compatibility and cost burdens. As of 2020, among 67,000 small and medium manufacturing enterprises with more than 10 employees, only 19,799 companies, about 30%, had established smart factories, and among them, 77.9% (15,423 companies) were still at the basic stage.

The report stated, "Collaborative robots have excellent versatility and great potential to create new demand due to their expansion possibilities into other industries such as medical, education, and culture services," and added, "To strengthen domestic collaborative robot competitiveness, securing in-house technology through expanded research and development (R&D) investment in core components and software, which have a high cost ratio, is crucial." Currently, the localization rate of core robot components such as motors, reducers, sensors, and software is only about 41%.

Lee Jun-myung, senior researcher at the Korea International Trade Association, said, "With significant changes surrounding the domestic manufacturing environment, including policy changes such as the 52-hour workweek and the Serious Accident Punishment Act, as well as the accelerated trend of unmanned and automated manufacturing due to COVID-19, collaborative robots can be a solution for small and medium manufacturing enterprises with limited capital." He argued, "The government should support the expansion of collaborative robot distribution by providing small and medium enterprises with subscription-based service robots (Robot-as-a-Service) that allow the use of only necessary robot functions through the cloud."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.