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Robots will replace a growing number of jobs in industries including automotive and electronics in the next few years, particularly in east Asia, according to new research.
一项新研究显示，未来几年，机器人将取代自动化和电子产品等行业越来越多的工作岗位，尤其是在东亚地区。
Worldwide sales of industrial robots rose 23 per cent last year and are on course to double by 2018, driving radical change in many manufacturing sectors, Boston Consulting Group said.
波士顿咨询集团(BCG)表示，全球工业机器人销量去年增长23%，到2018年将翻一番，这将令很多制造业领域发生彻底变革。
Although robots have been used in industry for decades, recent advances in technology have cut their costs and increased their capabilities, as a new generation of reprogrammable, multipurpose machines comes into service.
尽管机器人在工业中的使用已有几十年时间，但最近科技的进步降低了机器人成本并提升了其性能，此际新一代可再编程的多用途机器人正投入使用。
The prices of industrial robots have been falling steadily, dropping about 14 per cent in the past four years to $133,000 for a typical system, while capabilities have been expanding.
工业机器人的价格一直在稳步下降，过去4年已累计下跌14%左右，至13.3万美元，同时性能一直在提升。
Some robots are even cheaper: the Baxter robot from Rethink Robotics has a listed base price of $25,000, making it accessible to smaller companies that might have found it difficult to invest in earlier generations.
一些机器人的价格甚至更低： Rethink Robotics的Baxter机器人基础定价为2.5万美元，让那些可能很难投资于之前几代机器人的较小公司也能买得起。
Five countries — China, the US, Japan, Germany and South Korea — are expected to account for about 80 per cent of investment in industrial robots over the coming decade.
预计中国、美国、日本、德国和韩国5国将占到未来10年工业机器人投资的80%左右。
Advanced robots are set to cut costs and raise productivity, reducing employment in manufacturing in developed countries, while raising the skill levels demanded of the staff that remain.
先进的机器人旨在降低成本并提升生产率，从而减少发达国家制造业就业，同时提高现有员工所需的技能水准。
They are also likely to make labour costs a less significant factor for manufacturers making decisions about where to invest.
它们还可能会在制造商在做出投资目的地决定时，让劳动力成本的因素不那么重要。
About 200,000 industrial robots were shipped last year, BCG estimates, up from 163,000 in 2013, and in three years' time the number could rise to 400,000.
BCG估计，去年工业机器人销量达到20万台左右，高于2013年的16.3万台，到2017年，这一数字可能会升至40万台。
In the manufacturing sectors that are the most readily automated, including cars and other transport equipment, computers and electronics and electrical equipment, about 85 per cent of tasks can be performed by robots, according to BCG.
在最容易实现自动化的制造业（包括汽车和其他运输设备、电脑、电子产品和电器设备），约85%的工作可能会由机器人完成。
Those sectors are likely to use the most robots over the coming decade, but other areas such as chemicals and metals are also likely to see increasing adoption of the newer, more flexible machines.
未来几十年，这些行业使用的机器人可能会最多，但化工和金属等其他行业使用这种更为新颖灵活的机器的做法可能也会越来越多。
The uptake of industrial robots will vary between countries as well as between industries, depending on factors including wage costs and labour regulations that could limit employers’ ability to replace workers with robots. BCG expects the fastest adoption will come in South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand, which have heavy concentrations of the industries that are capable of high levels of automation, higher labour costs than some of their low-wage competitors, and limited employment protections that would prevent job cuts.
工业机器人的使用情况将会因国家和行业的不同而不同，这取决于很多因素，包括薪资成本以及劳动力监管规定——这些规定可能会限制雇主用机器人取代员工的能力。BCG预测，韩国、台湾和泰国将是最快使用机器人的国家，这些国家拥有大量能够实现高度自动化的行业，劳动力成本高于一些低薪资竞争国家，而且就业保护有限（就业保护将阻止裁员）。
Other relatively rapid adopters are expected to be China, Japan, the US, the UK and Canada.
预计其他使用工业机器人相对迅速的国家将是中国、日本、美国、英国和加拿大。
The countries likely to be slowest to embrace the new robots include more heavily regulated economies of Europe including France, Italy and Spain, as well as Brazil and India, according to BCG.
BCG称，最慢接纳新一代机器人的国家可能是那些欧洲监管较严的经济体，包括法国、意大利和西班牙等，还有巴西和印度。
