The 9th Auto Expo in New Delhi has a few firsts other than Tata?s small car, too. It is the 1st Robo Expo ever organised in India. ?This is for the first time ever that robot manufacturers across the world have been brought under one roof at the 1st Robo Expo, 2008,? said Surinder Kapur, chairman, manufacturing innovation mission, CII.

With a total of 11 exhibitors, pretty good for the first time, the expo interestingly has five domestic robot manufacturers including companies like Pari Robotics that displayed its automated golf robo, Hi-tech Robotic Systemz Ltd that introduced its three new products – Robot Vision, the fault detector for 100% quality assurance, Intellicart with vision based localisation (VBL) patented technology of Hi-tech and the most interesting, human eyed robot called Neel. ?The human eyed robot was launched on Wednesday. It will cater to nursing and household use,? said Anuj Kapuria, executive director, Hi-tech Robotic Systemz Ltd.

?It is targeted at both the Indian as well as overseas market,? he said. The cost of ?Neel? is Rs 3 lakh plus and the company is looking at volumes of around 100 a month coming from both the domestic market and exports. Intellicart and Robot Vision are priced at Rs 4 lakh and Rs 2 lakh onwards, respectively.

Other exhibitors included Motoman Motherson Robotics Ltd that introduced its two-arm robo priced at Yen 6 million.

Till date, the company has managed to sell 700 of its so-called Motoman. ?We plan to sell 100 Motoman in India in the year 2008-09,? said Ken Imamura, president, Motoman Motherson Robotics Ltd. Some of the clients of Motoman Motherson Robotics include Tata and Maruti Suzuki, among others.

Also on display were products of well-known companies like the Kuka Robotics (India) Pvt Ltd and ABB Limited.

Indicating that India is lagging behind when it comes to automation, Rajive Kaul, chairman CII apex Council of Trade Fairs, said, ?The country will see a growth of around 10% from the existing 3% in automation in times to come.?

He said that the around 1,40,000 robots will be produced globally by 2010. India will see installation of 20,000. Further, he added that the China and ASEAN countries, including India are witnessing much higher growth compared to the other parts of the world. There is also great demand for robots in countries like Italy, Sweden and Germany.

The 1st Robo Expo saw launch of 20 new robots. It is being organised by CII Competitiveness Council.