SALES of industrial robots in China, the world’s biggest market, will grow this year at only about a third of last year as an escalating Sino-U.S. trade spat hits spending on equipment, a global robot group said Thursday.

The International Federation of Robotics (IFR) in its annual report forecast Chinese demand for robots will grow 15-20 percent this year after surging 59 percent to 137,920 units last year.

With China accounting for 36 percent of the global robot market and with its sales volume exceeding the total of Europe and the Americas combined, slowing demand growth in the Asian nation is also impacting global demand.

IFR, which brings together nearly 60 global robot suppliers and integrators, predicts worldwide industrial robot sales this year will grow 10 percent compared to last year’s 30 percent.

Because of the trade spat, many global manufacturers “are now in a wait-and-see mode, wondering whether to shift production [away from China] to, let’s say, Vietnam or the United States,” IFR president Junji Tsuda said.

China’s robot market benefited last year from accelerated automation at smartphone and automobile plants. Foreign suppliers, mainly European and Japanese robot makers, accounted for 75 percent of robot sales in China, including those produced locally.

(SD-Agencies)