Hillhouse Capital leads the investment, and Blue Ocean Robotics, which is targeting lithium batteries, has received further financing

On June 8, Guangzhou Blue Ocean Robot Systems Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Blue Ocean Robot"), a provider of intelligent logistics and management systems, completed tens of millions of yuan in A and A+ rounds of financing, led by Hillhouse Capital.

It is understood that the financing funds will be mainly used to expand customer base and develop new products.

Public information shows that Blue Ocean Robotics was founded in 2016 and is an intelligent logistics system provider specializing in solution design, system integration, project implementation and after-sales service for AGV, RGV and Industry 4.0 unmanned factory systems.

At the system level, Blue Ocean Robotics believes that the overall system intelligence level of workshop logistics is extremely important, and the efficiency of product allocation will directly affect the factory's production capacity. Therefore, Blue Ocean Robotics independently developed robot positioning and navigation algorithms, robot control systems, workshop scheduling systems, and MES systems. Among them, the workshop scheduling system can be used to maintain workshop operations and robot allocation and production equipment allocation; the MES system connects information data including all process equipment and logistics equipment in the workshop, which is collected by the customer's data center and provides management support for workshop operations.

At the product level, Blue Ocean Robotics' robot product line currently covers a variety of navigation technology AGVs, including magnetic stripe navigation, laser navigation, and QR code navigation. The styles are rich and varied, including lurking, traction, drum, lifting, forklift, and omnidirectional.

At the same time, in terms of track selection, Blue Ocean Robotics has targeted new energy demand scenarios such as photovoltaics and lithium batteries. It is worth noting that Blue Ocean Robotics has previously received angel round investment from the listed company Haimuxing, which currently holds a 20% stake in Blue Ocean Robotics.

Haimxing's main business is currently divided into three categories, namely power battery laser and automation equipment, general laser and automation equipment, and display and brittle material precision laser and automation equipment. In recent years, the new energy industry has seen strong demand, and Haimxing has continued to receive large orders.

It can be said that Haimuxing’s advantages in the new energy industry have also promoted the development of Blue Ocean Robotics in the new energy field to a certain extent.

Xu Wenbin, founder and CEO of Blue Ocean Robotics, said that the company's performance began to explode last year. In 2021, the company earned tens of millions in revenue. So far in 2022, the company has received over 100 million orders, and has served projects such as Canadian Solar, Jolywood, Longheng, and Longi. Currently, Blue Ocean Robotics has a production and R&D base in Guangzhou, a production base in Changzhou, Jiangsu, and an MES system and big data center in Changsha.

Next, Blue Ocean Robotics has three key tasks in 2022. The first is to expand customers in the lithium battery industry. The second is to explore logistics-related needs in other high-end manufacturing industries such as semiconductors. The third is to invest in the research and development of the next-generation three-dimensional navigation system and three-dimensional vision navigation robot products.

Against the backdrop of the world responding to climate change and reshaping the energy landscape, new energy industries such as photovoltaics and lithium batteries have entered a stage of explosive demand and capacity expansion.

According to data from Gaogong Industry Research Institute (GGII), China's lithium battery shipments in 2021 were 327GWh, a year-on-year increase of 130%. It is expected that in 2022, China's lithium battery shipments are expected to exceed 600GWh, with a year-on-year growth rate of more than 80%. It is expected that China's lithium battery market shipments will exceed 1450GWh in 2025, with a compound growth rate of more than 45% in the next four years.

Facing the TWh era, the existing manufacturing model can no longer achieve breakthrough improvements, and it is urgent to introduce new ideas, new technologies, and new companies to fully empower it, including AI, Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT), intelligent robots, big data analysis, 5G and other related technologies.

Among them, intelligent robot technology plays an increasingly important role in material handling, loading and unloading, welding, assembly, testing, etc. Battery companies have begun to accelerate the introduction of robot applications, such as multi-joint robots, SCARA robots, mobile robots and other robot products have begun to be widely used in lithium battery production.

Take mobile robots as an example. In the face of the demand for automatic loading and unloading of rolls in the front-end coating, rolling, slitting, die-cutting, lamination and other processes of power batteries, mobile robots can be widely used in unpacking room material collection, coating winding and unwinding, rolling winding and unwinding, slitting and unloading, lamination machine unloading, etc.; in the middle and back stages, they can also meet the needs of temporary storage and transportation of line warehouses in production plants, and the transportation of modules and PACKs on and off the line; in logistics warehousing, they can meet the needs of transportation and turnover.

Data from Gaogong Robot Industry Research Institute (GGII) shows that the lithium battery industry's demand for mobile robots is expected to exceed 25,000 units by 2025, with a compound growth rate of more than 38% from 2021 to 2025.

Based on strong market demand, in addition to Blue Ocean Robotics' layout, some players in the field of mobile robots are also embracing the development opportunities of the lithium-ion new energy industry.

For example, in the case of extreme roll handling, Geek+ 's solution uses a single-cantilever customized AMR robot that can replace manual cart handling, achieve 360° laser obstacle avoidance, stop accuracy of ±5mm, and positioning accuracy of ±1mm. The cantilever car is directly connected to the winder to complete the loading task. In addition, Geek+ has also proposed solutions for raw material handling, coating/roller handling, material box/tray handling, module production, etc.

In the assembly process, Lanjian Intelligent 's logistics robot is equipped with an intelligent visual system, which actively determines the fork and the pallet fork hole through the intelligent camera matched with the fork, thereby automatically calibrating the fork extension position. On this basis, customers can also choose intelligent online monitoring (online detection of whether there is a cargo loading unit in the cargo position, real-time monitoring of the operation image and status of the stacker) and intelligent visual inventory and other functions according to their own needs.

UAI Zhihe The mobile robot matrix for the lithium battery industry covers the entire process of "stirring-coating-rolling-slitting-laser die-cutting-winding and laminating-shelling-liquid injection-packaging-chemical componentization-standing-inspection and outbound delivery", completing the full production cycle logistics automation operation and realizing the improvement of lithium battery production efficiency and benefits.

Jiazhi Technology Has provided corresponding intelligent factory logistics solutions for the production engineering, core making engineering, assembly engineering, chemical composition and module & PACK assembly engineering stages of many lithium batteries.

In addition, companies such as Jingsong Intelligent, HikRobot, Kailes, Future Robot, Jiashun Intelligent, Stand Robot, and Chuangzhi Technology have also provided mobile robot-based solutions for lithium battery manufacturers, which can be applied to production and logistics processes such as raw material warehouses, battery cell processing, and module PACK workshops.

On June 16, 2022, the 2022 Gaogong Lithium Battery Intelligent Manufacturing Summit with the theme of "Smart Manufacturing Transformation of Power Batteries in the TWh Era" will be held at the Maoshan International Conference Center, Oriental Salt Lake City, Changzhou, Jiangsu. The 2022 15th Gaogong Lithium Battery Industry Summit (June 14-15) and the 2022 Gaogong Energy Storage Industry Summit (June 17) will also be held during the same period.

At that time, the above companies will give wonderful speeches at the conference and discuss with the guests the development and integration of the power battery industry ecology in the TWh era. At 13:30 on the afternoon of June 16, the "2022 Lithium Battery Industry Robot Application Development Blue Book" will be released at the conference. As the participating units of the blue book, Estun, Huichuan Technology, Xin Jingcheng, Stand Robot, Huarui Technology, UAI Zhihe, HikRobot, Jiashun Intelligence, Jiazhi Technology, and Chuangzhi Technology will jointly witness the release of the blue book.