Recent sales figures are confirming a trend that first became evident toward the end of 2005: namely, that companies outside the automotive industry are accounting for an increasing number of industrial robot sales.
Part of this is due to weakness in the automotive sector. But, there's no doubt that robot use is expanding. In the first half of 2006, nonautomotive orders represented 45 percent of all orders in the United States, up dramatically from the first half of 2005 when nonautomotive orders accounted for just 29 percent of the total.