Europe’s automation sector ‘risks losing global competitiveness’
20 February 2025 
VDMA Robotics +Automation (VDMA R+A), the German-based organisation that represents 415 automation companies across Europe, is calling for action to halt the sector’s loss of global competitiveness.
“Europe’s industries are falling behind in international competitiveness and urgently need to catch up,” warns the organisation’s chairman, Dr Dietmar Ley. “China, for example, has shifted its focus to advanced technology and high-value manufacturing. The country’s drive for automation has seen its robot density double in four years to 470 robots per 10,000 workers.
“This is twice the European Union figure of just 219,” he points out. “Robotics and automation is the key enabling technology for the future growth of economies, increasing productivity, driving innovation and creating new opportunities.”
VDMA has issued a 40-page action plan for Europe aimed at policy-makers including national governments and EU institutions. Its key recommendations are:
- Give Europe’s robotics sector a boost Europe is increasingly being challenged by aggressive industrial policies in other countries – such as the America First agenda in the US, and China’s Five-Year-Plan for Robotics. A boost to robotics will help Europe to increase its competitiveness, safeguard its sovereignty, counteract demographic decline, and manage the transition to carbon neutrality, VDMA R+A says.
- More venture capital for European start-ups The regulatory framework for institutional investors needs to be updated to mobilise urgently needed additional venture capital for the robotics and automation sector. France’s Tibi Initiative has shown how capital can be successfully put to work for innovation – the rest of Europe should follow, VDMA suggests.
- Set up a competition roadmap Europe’s progress in robotics and AI needs to be benchmarked against developments in Asia and North America, and concrete national and European-wide technology roadmaps should be created.
- Focus on economies of scale Policymakers in Europe need to provide an environment that is conducive not only to innovation, but also to transferring innovation into mass production and wide adoption in Europe. VDMA says that Europe boasts a “fascinating” research and innovation landscape and great ideas are constantly born. However, it adds, success must ultimately be measured by bringing ideas to market at scale, as is demonstrated by China’s approach.
“We have no time to waste,” Ley warns. “Our new strategy paper is a call to policymakers across Europe to set the course on how to use robotics and automation to make Europe more competitive and resilient. Let us get to work now.”
VDMA R+A represents suppliers of components and systems for robotics, automated systems and machine vision. It is part of the wider VDMA organisation which represents 3,600 German and European mechanical and plant engineering companies, employing around three million people in the EU-27, more than 1.2 million of them in Germany. This sector is the largest employer in the capital goods sector in both the EU-27 countries and in Germany. In the EU, it represents a turnover of around €910bn. Around 80% of the machinery sold in the EU is produced in the single market.
