Element Group working on at least three acquisitions in industrial robotics
MOSCOW. June 5 (Interfax) - PJSC Element , one of Russia's largest microelectronics developers and manufacturers, is preparing three to five deals to acquire companies that will become part of its subsidiary JSC Robot Corporation , company president Ilya Ivantsov said in SberCIB webinar on Wednesday.
Element founded Robot Corporation in March as a wholly owned subsidiary with charter capital of 750 million rubles to develop a new area of business, industrial robotics.
"There is the buy and build model, where one can form a company in the target form in a relatively short time based on the integration of several assets. This is our plan. There are several companies - three, or five if everything works out - that could enter our perimeter and Robot Corporation's perimeter by the end of the year," Ivantsov said, without naming the companies Element is eyeing.
Speaking about the development of the new business in general, he said the group is planning mass production of robots in two segments, manufacturing and logistics.
The industrial robotics sector in Russia is still in its infancy, but there is currently serious interest in this market and it could already have several strong players in two to three years, when it will already be too late to enter the market, he said.
In the first phase of the market's formation, the manufacturing and logistics robot segments will see the most intensive development, Ivantsov said.
Element Group's goal is to create a leader with fully integrated production, from development of individual components to manufacturing of robots and their integration. The industrial robotics business could generate more than 10% of the group's revenue within the next two years, Ivantsov said.
The company will develop with a view to potentially raising additional capital in future by bringing in an investor or carrying out an initial public offering, he said.
The industrial robotics market in Russia is currently underdeveloped, a study by consulting company Kept (former Russian division of KPMG) found. It put the level of robotization in Russia at 19 robots per 10,000 workers, compared to a global average of 162 robots per 10,000 workers.
Furthermore, Industry Ministry data shows that Russia has only 13 main producers of industrial robots and only two of them build more than 200 industrial robots per year. The rest manufacture 26 to 100 robots annually. However, given unlimited demand, they are prepared to ramp up production to 1,500-3,000 robots per year.
Kept said that Russia has or might soon have various measures of state support aimed at developing industrial robotics. For example, this year there are plans to launch the Development of Industrial Robotics and Production Automation federal project, with a budget of about 350 billion rubles to 2030, under the Means of Production and Automation national project. The number of industrial robots at Russian businesses is supposed to increase to 99,000 by 2030. The announced budget for this project for 2025 and the planning period of 2026-2027 is 32.96 billion rubles.
At present, as a rule, every industrial robot is the result of R&D and intended to meet the specific requirements of the customer, and the customers are primarily large companies and plants. Accordingly, the cost of such a robot averages upwards of 30 million rubles.
However, companies are starting to emerge on the market that are focused on developing and building industrial robots for standard tasks, or so-called off-the-shelf robots, prices for which start at 3 million-4 million rubles.
