Confronted with an getting older inhabitants and labor shortages, Japanese companies are more and more counting on service robots to complement their workforce, according to Bloomberg.
Analysis agency Fuji Keizai tasks the nation’s service robotic market to just about triple by 2030, to ¥400 billion ($2.7 billion). Probably driving that progress: The Recruit Works Institute tasks that the nation will face a labor shortfall of 11 million by 2040, whereas a government-backed institute estimates that just about 40% of the inhabitants will probably be 65 or older by 2065.
As an example how robots are filling the hole, Bloomberg factors to the nation’s largest desk service restaurant chain, Skylark, which makes use of round 3,000 cat-eared robots to deliver meals to tables. At one the chain’s Tokyo eating places, 71-year-old Yasuko Tagawa estimated that half her job now entails some type of robotic help.
At one level, Tagawa advised a robotic, “Thanks to your exhausting work. I’ll be relying on you.”