To deal with China's wage growth, Iris Ohyama is intensifying push for robotics

To address growing wages and encourage automation, Japanese home goods manufacturer Iris Ohyama is putting about 100 industrial robots in place each year at its factories in China.

According to Naoki Kuramoto, the head of production for the company's Chinese operations, the company has introduced between 100 and 200 articulated-arm robots per year so far, which are utilized for assembly and transportation. He continued by saying that they have about 1,600 units at the moment. The company says that in the future, more robots of the same type will be added.

Ten facilities are run by the corporation in China, with seven in Dalian, its primary industrial hub, and the other three in Tianjin, Suzhou, and Guangzhou. They produce standard items like appliances and plastic storage containers.

China leads the Iris group in terms of value output, followed by the United States and Japan. Since Japan is still the primary market for their products, Chinese companies are routinely expanding their output.

According to Kuramoto, China will remain the nation that produces the most Iris Ohyama as long as the external environment remains unchanged.

Iris Ohyama intends to keep its current workforce of around 5,000 employees in China, of which about 4,000 are in Dalian, even with automation. According to Kuramoto, workers who are moved to different departments, such as the creation of new products or ventures, no longer carry out the same tasks.