Universal Robots' global workforce exceeded the 1,000 mark

Universal Robots (Universal Robots), a Denmark cobot manufacturer, announced that its global workforce has surpassed 1,000 after continuous growth. Of all Denmark companies founded after the turn of the millennium, only a few have now reached this milestone.

Universal Robots' global workforce exceeded the 1,000 mark

　　[Photo: Universal Robots Denmark Headquarters]

In 2005, three young researchers at the University of Southern Denmark, Esben Østergaard, Kasper Støy and Kristian Kassow, felt that robots were too bulky, expensive and complex at the time, so they founded Universal Robots in the university's basement to create robots that were more flexible, safe, easy to install and program. In 2008, Universal Robots pioneered the world's first commercial collaborative robot, the UR5, and since then has developed a portfolio of products that have grown to become a leader in the global collaborative robot market, and its headquarters in Odense, Denmark, have become one of the world's leading robotics research and development centers. Today, Universal Robots has sold more than 50,000 cobots worldwide and has subsidiaries and offices in more than 20 countries.

Kim Povlsen, President of Universal Robots, said: "Reaching 1,000 employees is a milestone for us. We are proud to have grown from a local start-up in the university basement to a global leader in the collaborative robotics industry. On top of that, the fact that many companies around the world are using our robots to grow their production and business shows that our products are excellent and recognized. ”

　[Photo: Kim Povlsen, President of Universal Robots]

Adam Sobieski, President of Universal Robots Greater China, said: "While Universal Robots continues to grow globally, the Chinese market has also made significant progress. China has always been a strategic location for Universal Robots, and we will continue to cultivate the Chinese market and attract local talent in the future. While developing our own team, we will also actively gather the strength of the ecosystem and vigorously develop the local partner network and UR+ ecosystem partners. With the dual blessing of technology and talents, we are not only able to provide products with excellent performance, but also determined to cultivate more collaborative robot experts to empower the automation transformation and upgrading of China's manufacturing enterprises. ”

[Photo: Bikai Su, President of Universal Robots Greater China]

Continue to attract talents and inject fresh water into innovation

Kim Povlsen added, "People tend to focus on breakthroughs in products and technologies themselves, but they don't happen spontaneously, they are driven by high-quality people, so companies need to keep attracting the best talent." At Universal Robots, our experienced and innovative employees are committed to pushing the boundaries of automation and making it easy for more people to enjoy the benefits of automation. We believe that the future development space is huge. At this milestone moment, we are not only pleased with what we have achieved today, but also passionate about creating more innovative products in the future. ”

Universal Robots' new UR20 launch earlier this year is the latest example of the innovative spirit of its talent team. There is an urgent demand for 20KG payload robots, but at the same time, they do not want to sacrifice other performance. To meet this need, Universal Robots' teams worked closely together and after three years of hard work, the robot arm was completely reimagined. In the end, the UR20 collaborative robot achieved a comprehensive breakthrough in load capacity, operation range and other aspects, while achieving a large load of 20KG and a working radius of 1750mm, the repeated positioning accuracy was as high as ±0.05mm, redefining the collaborative robot.

[Photo: UR20, a new product launched by Universal Robots earlier this year]

Universal Robots has always focused on attracting talent and constantly injecting new blood into innovation. In the past year alone, Universal Robots has added more than 200 employees worldwide. In China, Universal Robots also moved its China headquarters to the Jing'an International Center in Shanghai earlier this year. The new headquarters will be larger than the original, with a dedicated application and test center, and will employ a group of application engineering experts to form a global technology center of excellence to work more effectively with global product management and R&D teams. In the future, Universal Robots will continue to recruit talented people in China to ensure that Universal Robots can continue to meet the growing needs of Chinese customers.

Develop China's local ecology and condense the wisdom of partners

While Universal Robots has grown in size, its ecosystem has also continued to grow. Universal Robots' rich ecosystem includes more than 1,100 integrators, distributors and independent partners worldwide, resulting in a wide range of components, systems and solutions for Universal Robots. Each model in the Universal Robots portfolio offers plug-and-play, efficient integration with the rich set of end-effectors, controllers, sensors, functional software, and application suites in the UR+ ecosystem, making it suitable for a wide range of industries and easily adaptable for deployment for different tasks.

In China, UR+ offers more than 230 component products, nearly 20 application kits, and proven standard solutions for major collaborative applications such as welding, palletizing, machine care, locking, assembly, quality inspection, gluing, picking, handling, polishing, etc. As UR+ offers easy-to-configure and easy-to-use standard solutions, a one-stop product service platform, and highly integrated, high-quality robot peripherals, end-users increasingly see UR+ as an important decision-making factor in supplier selection, and the UR+ ecosystem is becoming a new driver of business growth for Universal Robots China. Potential UR+ partners in China also see the huge business opportunities and are actively investing more resources to work closely with Universal Robots, and the number of local UR+ partners is increasing.

Help the return of manufacturing talents and cultivate collaborative robot experts for the whole industry

The continuous acceleration of digital transformation and the continuous rise of labor costs have made the global collaborative robot market present a blue ocean. According to ABI Research, the global cobot market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 32.5% between 2020 and 2030, and the market size is expected to grow to $8 billion by 2030. At the same time, China, as the world's largest manufacturing producer, has seen rapid growth in the installed capacity of collaborative robots with the help of a number of national policies such as the "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Robot Industry".

Behind the huge demand for robots is the labor shortage that the global manufacturing industry is generally facing. When it comes to recruitment, low-paying, repetitive or labor-intensive jobs with certain health risks are not attractive to young people. The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security recently released the ranking of the 100 occupations with the "most shortage of workers" in the third quarter of 2022, as many as 39 belong to manufacturing-related personnel. At the same time, in terms of employment, the skills training and production quality assurance of young skilled workers, the stability of young skilled workers' careers, the high-load working status of senior technicians, and their ability to master emerging automation technologies are all typical employment challenges.

By using safe, flexible, and convenient cobots to replace tedious, dangerous, repetitive, and labor-intensive tasks, workers can focus on more valuable work and increase employee satisfaction and fulfillment. In addition, collaborative robots do not simply "replace" skilled workers, but through automation to stabilize the quality of production tasks, give young people new skills, and slow down the huge workload of senior technicians, thereby indirectly improving the working environment, helping workers to achieve skill iteration, so that more talents are willing to return to the manufacturing industry.

As a global leader in the field of collaborative robots, Universal Robots not only helps companies attract talent while improving efficiency through automation products, but also carries out a series of education and training initiatives to help the whole industry cultivate more collaborative robot experts, so as to prepare a good talent pool for China's manufacturing industry to continue to move towards the high-end of the industrial chain. At present, Universal Robots China has set up "Universal Robots Academy" training centers in Shanghai, Shenzhen, Beijing and Taipei, and at the same time deployed the "Universal Robots Academy" authorized training center project, which currently covers key cities such as the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Dongguan and Suzhou in the Yangtze River Delta region, so that students can participate in professional cobot training at the "doorstep".

President Su Bikai added: "The current prosperity of collaborative robots would have been unimaginable 10 years ago. Looking forward to the future, we are confident that we will continue to break through the boundaries of automation and create new brilliance. Universal Robots will continue to go all out to create each product, and wholeheartedly help each customer succeed with high-quality engineering, excellent talent and strong ecological resources. ”

Universal Robots' global workforce exceeded the 1,000 mark

Sections viewed

Contact

working hours