Since the departure of global industrial robot manufacturers, Russia has been striving to establish local robot production as a substitute, but progress has been minimal so far.

The Russian government appears to recognise the gravity of the situation. Earlier this year, the Ministry of Industry and Trade announced an ambitious – albeit equally unrealistic – national project aimed at propelling Russia into the top 25 nations in terms of robotisation.

The initiative includes preferential loans for companies adopting robots and subsidies for R&D. However, the challenges within the sector are too significant to anticipate any rapid advancements.

Riding poorly

Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and ensuing Western sanctions, several major manufacturers of industrial robots, including Kuka AG, Fanuc, ABB, Universal Robots and many others, exited the country. That prompted Russian authorities to start discussing plans to localise the production of robots in Russia.

However, at this point, Russia is doing so poorly in terms of robotisation, compared with other nations, that it's really difficult to see light at the end of the tunnel.

According to the national association of robotics market participants (NAUR), about 2,100 robotic complexes were installed in Russia in 2023. At first sight, this might seem impressive, as it implies a 20% growth year on year. However, if compared with the world's most industrialised nations, this figure looks ridiculously low. By comparison, China installed more than 300,000 robots in 2022, and Germany about 25,000.

 

Inadequate infrastructure

There are several reasons why Russia's robot segment is lagging behind those elsewhere, and plans to quickly launch adequate local manufacture are premature.

Primarily, Russia lacks a proper infrastructure of integrators that bring robots to companies. The entire Russian robotics market is held together by the efforts of seven to ten integrators, Roman Kolosov, deputy director and head of strategic planning at Training Institute-ARB Pro, wrote in a column for the Russian business daily RBC.

"This is very few," he wrote. "Integrators are those who customise and implement robots in production. Without them, you can buy the latest technology a hundred times, but there will be no one to put it into operation."

In addition, these integrators are mostly focused on specific industries. While those catering to the needs of financial institutions, like the Central Bank of Russia or Sber, are doing fine, those serving the car manufacturers are in poor shape as major foreign manufacturers, including Toyota, Volkswagen and Hyundai Motors wound down their activities in Russia.

Still, the most successful robot integrators are in high demand. For example, the integrator RoboCom has signed contracts until December 2025, and will not be able to take more. The throughput of those integrators dealing with project calculations, 3D modelling, tooling production, integration and service is very limited. Only a few companies in the market are capable of handling two or three projects at a time.

Therefore, even if a new robot arrives in the market, integrators can spend three to four months on its implementation, as no two production facilities are the same, each has its own specifics. Inexperienced integrators can take 8-16 months to implement it.

It's not an untypical scenario, when a robot integration budget of 10-15mn rubles ($93,000 to $140,000) is spent, and the robot stands idle in the dust. The owners who invested their money in this are disappointed and have lost faith in robotisation in general.

 

Personnel shortages

Another major headache for the Russian robot segment is personnel shortages. The Russian education system cannot train an adequate number of specialists to provide a solid starting base. Moreover, the quality of current training is questionable.

Back in the 2010s, Kawasaki, Kuka and other major global manufacturers started organising training classes and laboratories in Russia. However, with the Western sanctions slapped on Russia, these collaborations have been scaled back.

In addition, the salaries of robotics engineers and programmers are 30-50% lower than in the IT sector, causing migration to more lucrative segments. Those who remain in the market are working hard, but this is not enough for a serious leap forward.

 

Lack of heritage

Currently, some Russian industries are still riding on the scientific and educational base created back in the Soviet era. However, the robotics industry, unlike radio electronics, aerospace, metallurgy and nuclear industries, was poorly developed back in the Soviet Union. True, Soviet scientists created robots for emergency response and space flights, but these were prototypes not intended for mass manufacture.

The USSR, together with East Germany, Czechoslovakia and a number of other countries, also made attempts to jointly produce robots for a number of tasks. All in all, according to various estimates, the Soviet Union manufactured up to 100,000 robots by the early 1990s.

However, the Soviet Union never launched manufacture on a truly large scale, like 100,000 robots per year.

Meanwhile, according to Kolosov, when Russian manufacturers talk about localisation plans for industrial robots, they often mention reverse engineering. "Reverse engineering allows you to recreate the technology and finished products by taking apart all of its parts," he explained. "In other words, the Russian government and some manufacturers think that it would be possible to disassemble a foreign robot, element by element, and assemble its analogue that would become a locally manufactured replacement. But this is just wishful thinking."

 

Chinese replacements as a solution

In the wake of the exit of Western manufacturers Russian companies interested in robotisation are left with few options. One is buying robots manufactured in China. They are cheap and not affected by Western sanctions, but they are noticeably lacking in reliability and software quality.

"True, Chinese robots are cheaper, but when we start using them for complex tasks, they often turn out to be unreliable and we always have to keep one or two for replacement," a representative of a Russian robot integration company was quoted as saying by RBC. "And we honestly warn our customers about this. So, on the one hand, we got savings, but on the other hand, we started to lose on performance and reliability. China has now captured about 50-70% of the robotics market in Russia, and this will be the case for many years to come."

Meanwhile, robot imports from other countries are limited by sanctions. The only major global manufacturer that still remains active in the Russian market is Japan's Kawasaki. Other major manufacturers' robots could only be imported illegally, via third countries, which would lead to problems with support and software.

On the brighter side, some major Russian corporations, such as Rosatom, have started to actively invest in robotisation. The company plans to multiply the number of installed robots at its facilities in the coming years. Moreover, it is going to sell its robotic solutions not only to the domestic market, but also to foreign partners. But this is rather an exception, while the main picture in the Russian robot industry remains grim.