In 2011, Foxconn head Guo Taiming publicly stated, "Foxconn will manufacture 300,000 robots at a speed of 1,000 units per day for monotonous and dangerous work, and improve the company's level of automation and production efficiency. R & D is established at the base At the same time as the production of robots, I hope to assemble 1 million robotic arms by 2014 and see the first fully automated factories in 5 to 10 years. "
In 2011, Foxconn's "Million Robot Project" opened a strategic development opportunity for the Chinese robot industry, and greatly promoted the popularization and application of industrial robots. However, many recent reports show that the actual number of robots used by Foxconn is currently less than 100,000, and there is little time left to realize the assembly of 1 million robotic arms. The huge gap between the actual and the expected has once again pushed Foxconn to "robots." Instead of artificials, the discussion is on the cusp.
At that time, Guo Taiming proposed the "Million Robot Plan" to look forward to automation to deal with the huge cost pressures caused by rising salaries and increasingly fierce product competition pressures. However, under the global economic downturn, the cost and operational risk of developing and applying robots are increasing. The recent troubles of Apple ’s orders and the sluggish manufacturing industry have further aggravated the plight of Foxconn ’s robot program. According to analysis by Li Youhuan, director of the Guangdong Social Sciences Comprehensive Development Research Center, "Foxconn introduced 300,000 robots in 2012, at least an investment of 30 billion yuan is required; and the 3-year plan of 1 million units requires an investment of at least 100 billion yuan." Alberto Moel, an analyst at Sanford Bernstein, a research institute, has also said that Foxconn ’s "Million Robots Project" will cost between US $ 2.1 billion and more than US $ 10 billion, but compared to Next, Foxconn ’s annual capital expenditures are usually less than $ 3 billion. Foxconn's "Million Robot Project" is gradually becoming a mirage from the original magnificent scroll. Some people even compare Foxconn's "Million Robot Project" to "the carrot hanging in front of a donkey," which is just what Foxconn needs. A good story to boost the stock price. "
And let people once again delve into the origin of Foxconn's "Million Robots Project", which is a large-scale recruitment plan recently launched by Foxconn. It is understood that under the influence of Foxconn's "Million Robots Program", Foxconn has experienced significant staff reductions for many years in a row. At the beginning of this year, it was rare to carry out a "stop hiring" plan. However, Shenzhen may re-employ 90,000 employees in the next month. The IDPBG business group of Foxconn's Henan Zhengzhou plant for Apple's OEM new products has recently conducted similar large-scale recruitment.
Is automation and robots the manufacturing industry "carrots hanging in front of donkeys", or is it a new opportunity to really change the fate of enterprises? Where should the turning point in the dilemma of Foxconn's "Million Robots Project" be?
Liu Yihua, chairman of the Guangdong Association of Automation, pointed out that large-scale use of robot production, although the initial investment is large, but the long-term benefits are more cost-effective than manual; and the product quality is more guaranteed, which can reduce man-made quality problems. However, the current robot technology is lacking in the implementation of fine processing and intermediate links between machines. Take Foxconn as an example. In Foxconn's main mobile phone OEM business, the main application areas of robots are still in the front-end high-precision patching and back-end assembly and handling links. In most intermediate manufacturing links, manual labor is still required. To truly realize "large-scale application of robots, there are still a lot of problems to be solved."
At the same time, the author also believes that, if we want to truly implement high-end automation technology on a large scale, we must formulate a truly systematic and large-scale implementation plan. We must rely on the manufacturing process and stand from the perspective of the whole plant. Apply automation technology to all links and achieve optimized management of the whole plant. At the same time, the applied automation technology must take into account sufficient ductility and upgradeability, rather than a separate upgrade of a certain process or a certain pipeline . Otherwise, even with some high-end automation technology, due to the lack of overall plant optimization, it may only cost a huge amount of money, but it can't really bring benefits. Even, due to the limitation of product life cycle and technological upgrading, the production and development of the enterprise have been delayed. Future automation must stand at a higher angle to enhance the value of the enterprise!
Bringing industrial automation systems to the market is not a simple task. Increasing pressure from technical and commercial needs requires suppliers to provide leaner, more cost-effective systems to meet the performance needs of double the previous generation systems. How can designers increase processing speed, network bandwidth, and system efficiency while increasing productivity, reducing costs, and maintaining quality? So who can pay for the many challenges facing industrial automation systems? We may as well enter the world of Xilinx together and hear how Xilinx uses All Programmable technology to improve the efficiency and performance of industrial automation systems .
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