Foreign technology dominates industrial market for robotics

Though Japan was long considered the "robotics kingdom", China surpassed it as the largest market for industrial robots in the world in 2013, when a record-high 36,000 units were sold, Chinese media report.

Now domestic robot makers need to sharpen their edge in technological innovation to become competitive and take a bigger share of the huge market, experts said.

On average worldwide there are 55 industrial robots for every 10,000 employees, but the rate in China is just 23, according to a patent analysis report released by a research team at the State Intellectual Property Office.