Canton Fair diary: service robotics hall outshines industrial automation for robot AI
DominiqueCAPaul · x · 2026-10-19
A German blogger's day 5 in China: visiting the Canton Fair in Guangzhou (300,000 visitors), 60 minutes by train from HK.
- The service robotics hall had more relevant robot AI companies than the industrial automation hall, which was mostly task-specific machines and components like actuators; he guesses robot AI still shows up more at the World Robot Conference than at a buying show
- Far less English on the mainland than in HK; communication via hands and Google Translate
- Didi is absurdly cheap: 60 minutes from the fair to Foshan cost €12
- Evening stay in a gated community owned by Midea (the AC company that bought Kuka a decade ago), likened to Krupp building worker housing in the 19th century
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