RockEU

Robotics Coordination Action for Europe

Grant Agreement Number: 611247
17.01.2013 – 16.07.2016
Instrument: Coordination and Support Action

Market study on European robotics

Deliverable D3.1.1

Lead contractor for this deliverable: Fraunhofer IPA

Due date of deliverable: April 2014
Actual submission date: July 2014
Dissemination level: Public
Revision: 1.0
Executive summary
During the previous years, service robotics statistics has been well developed through the
International Federation of Robotics IFR, particularly through the long standing cooperation between
the IFR Statistical Department and Fraunhofer IPA; www.worldrobotics.org. While the statistical data,
published in the World Robotics Yearbook has been well received by media, funding agencies,
investors and technology scouts, it was felt that for effective policy making some facets are missing
such as data for the categorization of the supply side economics. Since many of these service robotics
companies are start-ups it is of particular interest to statistically monitor these in terms of growth, job
creation etc. in order to define measures to effectively fuel sustainable start-up creations and general
industrial innovation for economic growth and quality jobs.
The objective of this continuous activity in RockEU “market and society observations” is to provide a
solid basis of data from a European perspective regarding robotics market data, basic business
structural data of European robot suppliers, particularly in the fragmented service robotics domain for
fueling the RockEU activities particularly in its road-mapping and entrepreneurial-related aspects.
Furthermore, this task is dedicated to providing this information to stakeholder groups and media in
regular updates.
This extension of service robotics statistics will primarily build on the existing and established work of
market observation and surveys, statistics and forecasts provided by the annual World Robotics
Report (particularly the service robotics section), but will also be complemented by other public and
commercial data sources.
After the elaboration and introduction of a revised statistical scheme it is planned to slightly extend the
IFR questionnaire by further items (e.g. current employment numbers in service robotics) and carry out
a structural business survey. The result will be an annual report including an executive summary for
immediate communication to the robotics community, interested media or other interested audiences
(e.g., as a download).
This deliverable derives the missing criteria and items for structural business statistics in service
robotics, the procedure to retrieve these data and generate the statistics in a step-wise fashion. The
actual market and supplier analysis will be performed as a next step. Almost all structural business
data may be retrieved from business registers, particularly from http://www.ebr.org/ and other sources
(e.g. LexisNexis). Moreover we will include a categorization of end-user analysis of (professional)
service robotics. This will be the part of this year’s work for producing the upcoming Deliverable D3.1.2
in Month 28 (i.e. next year).

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Content
1. Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 4
2. Status regarding “market and society observations” ........................................................................ 4
2.1. History of the service robotics statistics .................................................................................. 4
2.2. Recent service robotics data ................................................................................................... 7
3. Approach towards a Structural Business Statistics .......................................................................... 8
4. Retrieval of other relevant service robotics industry data and further steps .................................. 10
5. Conclusion and outlook .................................................................................................................. 11
6. References ..................................................................................................................................... 11

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Chapter 1

1. Introduction
Coordination of research and development, technology transfer and entrepreneurial activities in
robotics should be based on current market developments, reliable forecasts and solid long-term
trends. These data should be completed with data characterizing the supply side of service robotics
(SR) through structural business statistics.
This will be of particular relevance for the road-mapping process (see WP1) with respect to the
prioritization of measures and policies related to technologies, innovation, public procurement, ELS-
issues, and standardization. Furthermore, consistent and comparable statistical material on market
data and forecasts, as well as on critical demands and trends is not only valuable for any type of
communication (from scientific/technical publications to dissemination and PR), but very much in
demand by any stakeholder group and the media in particular.
During the previous years, service robotics statistics has been well developed through the
International Federation of Robotics IFR, particularly through its Statistical Department;
www.worldrobotics.org. While the statistical data, published in the World Robotics Yearbook has been
well received by media, funding agencies, investors and technology scouts, it was felt that for effective
policy making some facets are missing, such as data for the categorization of the supply side, i.e.
service robot manufacturers. Since many of these companies are start-ups it is of particular interest to
statistically monitor these in terms of growth, job creation etc. to define measures to effectively fuel
sustainable start-up creations.
The objective of “market and society observations” is to provide a solid basis of data from a European
perspective regarding robotics market data (status, forecasts and major trends), basic business
structural data of European robot suppliers, particularly in the fragmented service robotics domain
(professional and domestic) and overall opportunities and trends for the activities in RockEU.
Furthermore, this task is dedicated to providing this information to stakeholder groups and media in
regular updates.
This extension of service robotics statistics will not only build on the existing and established work of
market observation and surveys, statistics and forecasts provided by the annual World Robotics
Report (particularly the service robotics section), but will also be complemented by other public and
commercial data sources (e. g. Eurostat, UNECE, OECD) where appropriate.
After the elaboration and introduction of a revised statistical scheme it is planned to extend the IFR
questionnaire by additional items and carry out a structural business survey. The result will be an
annual report including an executive summary for immediate communication to the robotics
community, interested media or other interested audiences (e.g., as a download).

2. Status regarding “market and society observations”

2.1. History of the service robotics statistics
In 1999, service robots statistics were assessed statistically for the first time through a joint publication
by IFR and the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN ECE, Geneva). Prior to this
effort a suitable classification scheme for the heterogeneous domain of service robots and a data
collection scheme have been worked out and improved ever since, jointly with standardization efforts
in robotics.
Today, the IFR World Robotics section on service robotics has established itself as the reference
publication in statistics, market forecasts, and product overview. Robot suppliers, media, government
bodies, financial analysts and technology scouts are among its readers.
In response to the increasing interest in service robotics it was decided in 2008 by the IFR Statistical
Department that from 2010 on the World Robotics Report be expanded into a two volume edition.
Therefore, the most recent volume published in September 2013 marked the fourth edition of the
World Robotics Service Robotics yearbook. Due to the overwhelming activities in the field, that volume
again has increased in size compared to the years before. The next issue is again expected to appear
in September 2014
The employed statistical scheme is based on the current ISO definition ISO 8373 of service robots:

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Chapter 2

• A robot is an actuated mechanism programmable in two or more axes with a degree of

autonomy, moving within its environment, to perform intended tasks. Autonomy in this context
means the ability to perform intended tasks based on current state and sensing, without
human intervention.
• A service robot is a robot that performs useful tasks for humans or equipment excluding
industrial automation application. Note: The classification of a robot into industrial robot or
service robot is done according to its intended application.
• A personal service robot or a service robot for personal use is a service robot used for a
non-commercial task, usually by lay persons. Examples are domestic servant robot,
automated wheelchair, and personal mobility assist robot.
• A professional service robot or a service robot for professional use is a service robot used
for a commercial task, usually operated by a properly trained operator. Examples are
cleaning robot for public places, delivery robot in offices or hospitals, fire-fighting robot,
rehabilitation robot and surgery robot in hospitals. In this context an operator is a person
designated to start, monitor and stop the intended operation of a robot or a robot system.
• A robot system is a system comprising robot(s), end-effector(s) and any machinery,
equipment, devices, or sensors supporting the robot performing its task.
According to the definition, “a degree of autonomy” is required for service robots ranging from partial
autonomy (including human robot interaction) to full autonomy (without active human robot
intervention). Therefore, in addition to fully autonomous systems service robot statistics include
systems which may also be based on some degree of human robot interaction (physical or
informational) or even full tele-operation. In this context human robot-interaction means information
and action exchanges between human and robot to perform a task by means of a user interface.
Since the mid-90s, UNECE and IFR have adopted a preliminary definition and system for classifying
service robots by categories and types of interaction which has converged over the years into the
current classification scheme; see Table 2.1 and Table 2.2.
Section I Types of robots: Service robots for personal/domestic use
1-6 Robots for domestic tasks
1 Robot companions/assistants/humanoids
2 Vacuuming, floor cleaning
3 Lawn mowing
4 Pool cleaning
5 Window cleaning
6 Others
7-10 Entertainment robots
7 Toy/hobby robots
8 Multimedia/remote presence
9 Education and research
10 Others
11-13 Elderly and handicap assistance
11 Robotized wheelchairs
12 Personal aids and assistive devices
13 Other assistance functions
14 Personal transportation (AGV for persons)*
15 Home security & surveillance*
16 Other Personal / domestic robots

Table 2.1: Classification of service robots by application areas and types of robots; service robots
for personal/domestic use.

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Chapter 2

Section II Types of robots: Service robots for professional use

17-23 Field robotics
17 Agriculture
18 Milking robots
19 other robots for livestock farming*
20 Forestry and silviculture
21 Mining robots
22 Space robots
23 Others
24-28 Professional cleaning
24 Floor cleaning
25 Window and wall cleaning (including wall climbing robots)
26 Tank, tube and pipe cleaning
27 Hull cleaning (aircraft, vehicles, etc.)
28 Other cleaning tasks
29-31 Inspection and maintenance systems
29 Facilities, plants
30 Tank, tubes, pipes and sewers*
31 Other inspection and maintenance systems
32-35 Construction and demolition
32 Nuclear demolition & dismantling
33 Building construction
34 Robots for heavy/civil construction
35 Other construction and demolition systems
36-39 Logistic systems*
36 Automated guided (AGV) vehicles in manufacturing environments
37 AGVs in non-manufacturing environments (indoor)
38 Cargo handling, outdoor logistics
39 Other logistics
40-43 Medical robotics
40 Diagnostic systems*
41 Robot assisted surgery or therapy
42 Rehabilitation systems
43 Other medical robots*
44-46 Rescue & security applications
44 Fire and disaster fighting robots
45 Surveillance/security robots
46 other rescue and security robots
47-50 Defense applications
47 Demining robots
48 Unmanned aerial vehicles
49 Unmanned ground based vehicles (e.g. bomb fighting)
50 other defense applications
51 Underwater systems
52 Powered Human Exoskeletons
53 Mobile Platforms in general use
54-58 Public relation robots and joy rides
54 Hotel and restaurant robots
55 Mobile guidance, information robots
56 Robots in marketing
57 Robot joy rides**
58 Others*
59 Other professional service robots not specified above

Table 2.2: Classification of service robots by application areas and types of robots; service robots
for professional use.

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Chapter 2

Since very few national organizations have had any comprehensive statistics on service robots at all,
UNECE and IFR decided to collect the statistics directly from the manufacturers of service robots
worldwide. This process has been maintained (and improved) ever since. In regular, systematic
mailings, service robot manufacturers are asked to report data broken down by the given application
areas. Figure 2.1 depicts the annual data collection procedure.

Figure 2.1: Annual procedure for collecting service robotics data by the IFR

2.2. Recent service robotics data

About 16,100 service robots for professional use were sold in 2012, 2% more than in 2011, reports the
IFR Statistical Department in the new study “World Robotics 2013 – Service Robots”, which was
published 18 September 2013 Frankfurt. The sales value slightly decreased to US$ 3.4bn. See Figure
2.2 and Figure 2.3 for more detail. Turning to the projections for the period of 2013 to 2016, sales
forecast which were provided by companies worldwide indicate an increase to about 94,800 units with
a value of about US$ 17.1bn.
About three million service robots for personal and domestic use sold in 2012
So far, service robots for personal and domestic use are mainly in the areas of domestic (household)
robots, which include vacuum and floor cleaning, lawn-mowing robots, and entertainment and leisure
robots, including toy robots, hobby systems, education and research.
In 2012, it was estimated that two million domestic robots were sold, which is 15% more than in 2011
and include all the types listed above. The value was about US$ 697m. As for entertainment robots,
about 1.1m units were counted in 2012, 29% more than in 2011. Numerous companies, especially
from Asia, offer relatively low-priced “toy robots”. But among those mass products there are
increasingly more sophisticated products for the home entertainment and hobby market. The total
value of the 2012 sales of entertainment robots amounted to US$ 523m.
It is estimated that about 22m units of service robots for personal use will be sold between 2013 and
2016 thus indicating the continued strong growth of service robotics in this field.

Annual sales Main applications Annual sales Other application categories

[units sold] [units sold]

7 000 700
6 000 600
5 000 500
4 000 400 2011
2011
3 000 300 2012
2012
2 000 200
1 000 100
0 0

Figure 2.2: Annual sales in units for service robotics in professional application areas (excerpt)

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Chapter 3

Sales: Personal/Domestic Robots

Annual sales Photos:
Samsung
[in Mio. US$] neato xv
Aldebaran NAO
6 000 Festo Robotino
Friendly Robotics
Total forecast
5 000 2013-2016
2012
4 000
2011
3 000

2 000

1 000

0
Household Entertainment,
robots leisure robots

Figure 2.3: Annual sales and forecasts for personal/domestic robots

3. Approach towards a Structural Business Statistics

Data currently retrieved by questionnaire among 250+ service robot manufacturers contain the
following set of data, see Figure 3.1 and Table 3.1:
Robots sold in 2013 Robots sold in 2013 Projected sales in 2014-2017
number of units turnover in millions of national currency Forecast for your company
total turnover
number of in millions of
units national
Europe America Asia/Pacific others Total Europe America Asia/Pacific others Total total world currency
I Personal/Domestic Robots 0 0 0 0 0 0,000 0,000 0,000 0,000 0,000 0 0,000
1-6 Robots for domestic tasks 0 0 0 0 0 0,000 0,000 0,000 0,000 0,000 0 0,000
- Robot companions /
1
/ assistants / humanoids
2 - Vacuuming, floor cleaning
3 Lawn mowing

Table 3.1: Extract of template for accessing data sent out to service robot suppliers according to
categories depicted in Figure 3.1.

Retrieval of
structural business
• Economic activity
data
>250 • Main location
Service robot • Employment
Service robot Company Business
manufacturer
Service robot • Legal form
manufacturer specific data demographics
manufacturer • Ownership
• Enterprise birth
Service robotics • Creation of business
Service robotics
application
Service area
robotics • Turn-over
application area Output-related
application area • Value added
• Labor input
Robot sales
Input-related • Goods, services input
Retrieved previous year
• Capital input
annually through World region
questionnaite
Robot units

Robots in
value [currency]

Figure 3.1: Extension of currently retrieved service robotics data (orange) by new data categories
on industry structure (blue)

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Chapter 3

The goal of the company specific data is to characterize the supply industry according to typical data
along the main categories of structural business statistical (SBS) data: business demographics, output
and input related data.
Generally SBS describe the economy through the observation of the activity of units engaged in an
economic activity. They answer such questions as: how much wealth is created in an activity? How
many work forces are needed to create this wealth? How is this activity developing? Is this activity
participating in the growth of the economy? How much investments are realized in this activity?
These categories and their sub-categories are in line with typical statistical frameworks provided by
Eurostat or OECD etc. Typical under-categories are [1]:
• Economic activity (principal, secondary, ancillary). The principal activity of a statistical unit is
the activity which contributes most to the total value. The identification of a principal activity is
necessary to allocate a unit to a particular ISIC / NACE heading added of that unit, see [2], [3]
for explanation of the systematics of economic activities.
• Main location
• Legal form or ownership. The following legal forms can be found in most Member States:
o Sole proprietorship: Enterprise owned exclusively by one natural person.
o Partnership: Association of persons who conduct a business under a collective name.
It can take the form of a limited partnership.
o Limited liability companies: Enterprises comprising joint-stock companies, limited
partnerships with share capital and private limited company.
o Non-profit making bodies.
o Enterprises with other forms of legal constitution: This group includes nationalized
industries, or publicly-owned enterprises.
• Enterprise birth is the date on which a unit was born.
• Number of persons employed/employment is defined as the total number of persons who work
in the observation unit (inclusive of working proprietors, partners working regularly in the unit
and unpaid family workers), as well as persons who work outside the unit who belong to it and
are paid by it (e.g. sales representatives, delivery personnel, repair and maintenance teams).
• Total purchases of goods and services include the value of all goods and services purchased
during the accounting period for resale or consumption in the production process, excluding
capital goods (the consumption of which is registered as consumption of fixed capital).
• Turnover comprises the totals invoiced by the observation unit during the reference period,
and this corresponds to market sales of goods or services supplied to third parties; it includes
all duties and taxes on the goods or services invoiced by the unit with the exception of the
VAT invoiced
• Value added at factor costs is the gross income from operating activities after adjusting for
operating subsidies and indirect taxes.
• Capital input is defined as investment during the reference period in all tangible goods.
Included are new and existing tangible capital goods, whether bought from third parties or
produced for own use (i.e. Capitalized production of tangible capital goods), having a useful
life of more than one year including non-produced tangible goods such as land.

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Chapter 4

4. Retrieval of other relevant service robotics industry

data and further steps
Most of the data for creating service robotics structural business statistics can be retrieved from typical
public sources such as business registers (e.g. public: http://www.ebr.org/ or private e.g. NexiLexi [4]).

Item/ category Business registered Prio Data Possible source for data retrieval
already
used business register questionnaire

Business demo- Economic activity (primary) H 

graphics
Main location H 

Employment (total, in SR) H   (total)  (SR)

Legal form, ownership M  

Enterprise birth M  

Creation of SR business/year H  ()

Output related Total turn-over H  

Value added (in SR) M  ()

Labor input (in SR) M  ()

Input related Goods, service input (in SR) L  ()

Capital input (in SR) L  ()

Table 4.1: Source for data retrieval for structural business statistics of service robotics industry
(Relevance coding: H=high, M=medium, L=low); check-marks in parenthesis are
optional criteria for later considerations

The implication is that the IFR questionnaire should be extended by two items which may be of value
for further statistics not easily possible to retrieve otherwise:
• Employment in service robotics (annually)
• Creation of service robotics activities (once)
All other data rated of higher relevance may be retrieved from business registers
• (total) Employment
• Legal form, ownership
• Total turn over
Future extensions may comprise additional info to be retrieved from individual companies such as:
• Value added (in SR)
• Labor input (in SR)
• Goods, service input (in SR)
• Capital input (in SR)
Further steps are defined in the following way, see Figure 4.1.
• Typically service robotics related addresses are continuously collected. The following are a
great source to facilitate this process: supporting organisations and persons such as the
industrial member directory of euRobotics, national robotics associations as given in [5] or
private organisations such as [6]. The service robotics internal data base is now approaching
some 300 addresses.
• Efforts are underway to send our questionnaire by national robotics associations. This
procedure is now well established for Korea, and japan is expected to follow. Both
organisations are accepting the classification scheme given above. Further discussions are
needed for further industry structural data categories.

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Chapter 5

• Information is collected, edited, published by the IFR. Through the cooperation with the IFR it
is expected that these data may be accessed and enriched by European industry structural
data sources for further market research.

• Collect service robotics addresses (continously) through various sources

Worldwide:
National • Use standardized classification scheme (ISO)
Robotics • Send out, collect and consolidate statistical data on basis of standardized
Organisations classification scheme (at least in most items); expand statistical scheme

• Submit to IFR Statistical Department

Collection of
Service Robotics • Production and publication of Annual World-Wide statistics by IFR Statistical
specific data Department

• Merge specific service robotics data with other sources (business registers,
Market research UNECE/UNECE, business research data bases)
and forecasts • Produce national, EU-wide surveys

Figure 4.1: Procedure for producing national, EU-wide surveys.

5. Conclusion and outlook

The last robotics questionnaire was prepared around Christmas 2013, sent out in February and is
being collected and processed at the moment. As it was not possible to integrate the full set of items
listed above into the questionnaire for this year’s round, the remaining criteria (Employment in service
robotics, Creation/start of service robotics activities) is planned to be included in the next round.
All other data may be retrieved from business registered, particularly from http://www.ebr.org/ and
other sources (e.g. LexisNexis).

6. References

[1] „Structural business statistics (sbs); Reference Metadata in Euro SDMX Metadata Structure
(ESMS). Compiling agency: Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union,“ [Online].
Available: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_SDDS/DE/sbs_esms.htm. [Zugriff am 1 July
2014].

[2] „Detailed structure and explanatory notes ISIC Revision 4,“ United Nations Statistics Devision,
[Online]. Available: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/cr/registry/regcst.asp?Cl=27. [Zugriff am 1 July 2014].

[3] „NACE Rev. 2 - Statistical classification of economic activities,“ European Commission eurostat,
[Online]. Available: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/nace_rev2/introduction.
[Zugriff am 1 July 2014].

[4] „LexisNexis Products & Services,“ LexisNexis (r), [Online]. Available: http://www.lexisnexis.co.uk/.
[Zugriff am 1 July 2014].

[5] „International Federation of Robotics; IFR Industry associations,“ [Online]. Available:

http://www.ifr.org/association/members/industry-associations/ . [Zugriff am 1 July 2014].

[6] F. Tobe, „Industry Directories,“ [Online]. Available: http://www.therobotreport.com/directory. [Zugriff

am 01 July 2014].

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