EXPLORING DEVELOPMENTS IN THE ROBOTICS SPACE

The word robot can be traced back to 1920, when Czech playwright Karl Capek introduced it in his hit play, “Rossum’s Universal Robots”, a show that depicted robots taking over the world.1 Despite Capek’s chilling vision (and countless of our favorite films that have followed on the same theme – from Metropolis to The Matrix), robots have coexisted alongside humans for decades without a cinematic uprising.

The first industrial robot was rolled out by General Motors in 1959; the robot, called “The Unimate”, was a hydraulic arm that performed repetitive tasks such as welding.2 Seven years later, friendly robots entered pop culture when “The Unimate” appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson to play golf. (Check out the clip!)

As technology has become more powerful, efficient, and cheaper, robots have become more ubiquitous. In fact, North America robot sales have reached record highs for three straight quarters.3 We’ve also seen a range of robots enter our day to day lives: they vacuum floors, mow lawns, craft the perfect cup of coffee and even provide companionship. (This author’s vacuum and mop are named Rick and Rachael – after the protagonists of Blade Runner – they both clean and provide companionship, but no clarity yet as to whether they dream of electric sheep.) While fear of a robotic takeover is understandable, their ascension is anything but a zero-sum game. In fact, automation is combating supply chain disruption and inflation, allowing employees to move faster and focus on higher-value tasks.

DEMAND: HOW ROBOTICS USE CASES ARE GROWING ACROSS INDUSTRIES

We see two key segments of the economy driving near-term robotics adoption: logistics and healthcare. As the expected wait time on e-commerce orders has shrunk from weeks to days to hours, companies must find safe, cost-effective ways to automate warehouses. 80% of warehouse operators agree they will have to rely upon more automation in the future.10 Today, robots are largely used to move inventory around the warehouse in an efficient and safe manner. These robots, known as AMRs (autonomous mobile robots), are like self-driving cars. Going forward, robots will be leveraged for “order picking,” which is the act of finding the item inside the warehouse and bringing it to the packing station. Humans are not particular good at order picking. Robots reduce warehouse error rates by up to 67%. Moreover, they help address warehouse injuries: today, over 200K non-fatal accidents per year in U.S warehouses cause pain and suffering for employees alongside financial costs for companies of over $84M per week.

Healthcare similarly could see more robotics, with increasing usage in surgery, nursing, and cleaning. Robot-assisted surgical procedures offer benefits to doctors and patients and tend to improve outcomes. Typically, a surgical robot will have one arm with a camera, giving the surgeon a view of the affected area at up to 10x magnification versus the human eye. A second robotic arm will hold surgical instruments, allowing a degree of precision and steadiness not possible with human hands – the smaller resulting incisions improve outcomes and shorten recovery times – reducing pain, blood loss and scarring.14 Robotic surgery has become particularly important for urological and gynecological procedures, which make up about half of robotic procedures today. Globally, about 3% of surgeries are performed robotically, leaving tremendous runway for growth.

Nursing robots are also seeing growing demand at a time when nursing shortages are dire, with 1.2m new registered nurses needed in the U.S. by 2030. Robots assist nurses by performing time-consuming tasks, such as medicine delivery, collecting lab samples and taking vital signs. The robotic nursing market is expected to grow more than 22% per year through 2026, reaching more than $2b in annual sales.