Douglas-Westwood, an energy research group, says (in their $5,000 World ROV Operations Market Forecast 2013-2017 report), that ROV operations expenditures will grow 80% over the next 5 years.
75% of the ROV vehicles are used as work-class vehicles; the remainder are for inspection.
The combined purchase and operations expenditures over those years will be $9.7 billion.
Insight into those numbers provided by Unmanned Vehicle Systems Consulting said that global ROV sales in 2010 were $850 million of which 50% were for energy use; 25% for defense and security and 25% for scientific research.
Further, roughly 20% of the vehicles were autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs); the rest were ROVs (remotely operated vehicles).
In the first episode of Robot Talk season 7, Claire chatted to Aaron Edsinger from Hello Robot about their Stretch robots that can help people with mobility issues live more independently.
China is targeting the next industrial revolution by doubling down on embodied AI and humanoid robotics, building directly on its vast manufacturing infrastructure.