Korea Ups Its Robots Game

Governments can set goals to compete in specific industries, and South Korea’s global ambition is to exceed other countries in advanced robotics. Currently the nation ranks fourth in development of industrial robots, after Japan, the United States and the EU. The three nations and Germany represent 50 percent of the global robotics market; China is the biggest market. Robot Land, a combined theme park/research and development lab in Incheon, is designed to inspire youth and demonstrate just what robots can do – cook, clean, build cars and electronics, as well as do surgery. The South Korean government is investing 1.1 trillion won, about US $1 billion, in robotics. The “industry has doubled in size since 2009, with revenue reaching 2.1 trillion won in 2012, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy,” report Brian Bremner and Rose Kim for BloombergBusinessweek. “The government seeks to boost that to 7 trillion won by 2018 with 600 domestic robot companies employing 34,000 workers.” New robots coming off the production lines could displace many human workers. – YaleGlobal