Growing Urbanization is Bringing Robots into Construction

According to data by the World Bank approximately 55% of the world population, which counts for 4.2 billion people, live in cities. The culture of urbanization is expected to pursue over the coming decades. By 2050, the urban population worldwide is expected to get double; nearly estimated that 7 out of 10 people across the world will be living in cities. Capping a century of migration away from rural areas and toward dense urban centers will increase the demand for advanced robotics construction.

The requirement and rapid growth in urbanization bring challenges that include meeting the sky-high demand for affordable housing and accommodations, well-connected transport systems, and other necessities. Major economies worldwide think that constructing more houses is the solution to control the price of homes in urban areas for middle-class citizens to afford to buy a house. The rising demand for infrastructure and housing solutions in growing economies is expected to accelerate their investment in construction technologies. Burgeoning urbanization and increased housing demand provided to meet the need have pushed the robotics construction market. Also recognizing the sector goes through labor shortfalls, rising labor prices, and safety issues, construction technology developers welcome construction as ripe for automation adoption. Heavy equipment providers like Husqvarna, and Brokk, which makes demolition robots, are leaning in. These construction robots are specially developed for demolition work in cramped spaces where the job requires a maneuverable and compact machine with high demand for demolition efficiency.

Safety of the Workers

Moreover, the construction market is bound to some stringent regulations in terms of providing safety to construction industry workers. The sector has a history of some of the highest number of labor accidents. Thus, the government focus on protecting the workers working in such strident and raucous situations. When construction workers enter confined spaces, they are coming across life-threatening hazards like toxic substances, electrocutions, explosions, and asphyxiation. In such areas, robotics can be a lifesaver. Using robots can overcome safety adherence and will also cut costs associated with ensuring worker safety in such positions.

Regional Insights

The global robotics construction market is flourishing based on North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and the rest of the world. North America and Europe have the superlative share among the other regions. The excessive level of unemployment and shortage of skilled labor in The United States has driven a deep path in the growth of the construction robotics market in the North American region. Where manual labor turns out to be a huge and very critical element of modern construction, technology and robots have been steadily improving and advancing. Robots like demolition robots and 3D printing construction robots are self-sufficient to get the work done independently without any burden on humans. This factor is expected to drive the regional market of North America. The region is expected to have a valuation of USD 54 million during the forecast period. In the United States, the construction industry was majorly dependent on manual labor earlier.

Also, during the Covid-19 pandemic, the industry faced a labor shortage, which further complicated the problems for the industry with social distancing policies in the picture. This situation uplifted robotics into the picture, pushing the growth of construction robots in the region. However, it can be seen that crucial regional players are launching innovative robots along with various partnerships among players catering to the region's growth, which is expected to hike up demand in the regional market. A legion of robotics start-ups in Europe already started developing robots focused on the construction industry. This focus is to resolve the issue faced due to manual labor and make the industry more efficient. Presently, on average, there are 1.2 robots for every 10,000 workers in the construction sector in the region. This number is significantly higher than in the United States, where the number is 0.2, and 0.1 in China. Such factors drive the European construction robotics market. European builders are flourishing when it comes to robotization.

Conclusion

As with auto manufacturing and logistics, inefficiencies discover opportunities where automation is concerned. This can be proven with the above data which shows a sustainable transformation in construction technology. Taken together, the table seems set for a major automation revolution in construction.