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Kuka’s chief sure Chinese ownership beneficial
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CHINESE ownership should benefit Germany’s Kuka, the German firm’s robotics chief said, as the company and its shareholders mull a 4.5 billion-euro (US$5.1 billion) offer from home appliances maker Midea.
Kuka already sells 25 to 30 percent of its robots in China, Stefan Lampa said yesterday, adding it was essential to have research and development centers there for the local market, as the German robotics firm has had for the past year-and-a-half.
China, whose government has made the automation of manufacturing a top priority, is the world’s biggest industrial robot market, although growth in robot demand there slowed to 17 percent last year from 56 percent a year earlier.
“China is a super-important market in robotics. Having an owner that comes from that market most probably will be beneficial for us or for whoever has a Chinese owner,” Lampa told Reuters in an interview.
Kuka’s chief executive Till Reuter has welcomed Midea’s bid, the largest yet by a Chinese buyer for a German company, but has yet to make an official recommendation to shareholders.
Meanwhile, Kuka’s supervisory board has given him a free hand in negotiating with Midea, sources told Reuters on Tuesday, over potential points of contention such as guarantees to protect jobs and intellectual property.
Robots are increasingly being used in factories and also for tasks such as personal care or surgery. Kuka’s robotics sales last year totaled 910 million euros, and Lampa said Chinese growth was in a different league to other markets.
Kuka is expanding into electronics and other sectors but still makes the lion’s share of its revenues in automotive.
“The speed of deployment is completely different. Here we talk about installing 100 robots in a factory in a year, there we talk about 1,000,” he said at the Automatica robotics fair.
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