Industry Stakeholders Convene at Shanghai Forum on Intelligent Surgical Robots and Hospital Management Amid IPO Filing Surge

“China is poised to become the most dynamic and robust market for surgical robots globally.”

On November 3, the “Steadfast Practice, Intelligent Reach—High-Level Summit on Intelligent Surgical Robots and Hospital Management,” hosted by the China Association of Medical Equipment, co-hosted by Baodian Jianwen, and supported by Medtronic, was officially held in Shanghai.

At the conference, Hou Yan, Chairman of the China Association of Medical Equipment, stated that over the past five years, the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of China’s surgical robot market has exceeded 30%. This indicates that an increasing number of healthcare institutions are introducing and applying surgical robots, regarding them as a key approach to enhancing clinical value and management standards in hospitals. In her view, the application of surgical robots is not only profoundly transforming surgical practices in relevant specialties but also reshaping medical behaviors and service models. It has become an effective lever for addressing the challenges of insufficient and uneven distribution of high-quality medical resources, while promoting clinical safety, quality of care, and patient satisfaction.

Amid rapid development, the industry must also directly confront the dilemmas and challenges of its early stages. On one hand, the introduction and adoption of surgical robots in hospitals require supportive policies as a safeguard. On the other hand, sustained innovation within the industry demands close collaboration among academia, research institutions, enterprises, and medical practitioners, as well as strong support from both policy frameworks and capital investment.

The minimization of surgical invasiveness and the enhancement of precision in minimally invasive surgery have become the prevailing trends in surgical practice in recent years. Compared with traditional surgical models, surgical robots provide the most robust technical support for achieving “minimally invasive surgery and precise minimally invasive procedures.”

Surgical robots are frequently employed in confined surgical fields to enable precise manipulation of surgical instruments beyond the limits of human capability. Taking orthopedic surgical robots as an example, these systems construct three-dimensional models based on medical imaging and perform coordinate system registration with the actual lesion and surgical tools, thereby assisting surgeons in conducting navigation-guided procedures. In contrast to traditional orthopedic surgeries, which largely rely on surgeons’ mental calculations based on patient CT scans and practical experience, surgical robots can plan surgical pathways more rapidly and accurately, enhancing both safety and operational efficiency.

“In the early days of spinal surgery, localization and manipulation relied heavily on surgeons’ experience and tactile feedback, inevitably leading to various complications, such as accidental nerve injury,” said Ding Wenyuan, Chief Physician at the Third Hospital of Hebei Medical University. “By enabling preoperative planning and facilitating precise maneuvers via robotic arms, surgical robots have significantly expanded and enhanced surgeons’ operational capabilities, thereby reducing surgical trauma and improving procedural accuracy.”

Notably, the application of surgical robots can also advance standardized training for physicians, facilitating the widespread adoption and standardized use of relevant surgical procedures. Du Qijun, Assistant Dean of The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital, explained that in the past, only experienced specialists could perform certain complex surgeries. However, with effective utilization of robotic systems and comprehensive training, these complex procedures can be more widely implemented. This allows experienced specialists to devote more time to researching novel surgical techniques, thereby enhancing medical technical standards and promoting high-quality development in hospitals.

For physicians, surgical robots serve as valuable assistants in enhancing medical service capabilities, while for patients, they act as guardians that reduce surgical risks. Taking the Mazor X intelligent navigation system for spinal surgery as an example, compared with open surgery, Mazor X-assisted procedures can reduce screw placement time by 45%, decrease intraoperative radiation exposure by 78%, and help patients achieve nearly a 50% reduction in intraoperative blood loss and more than a 43% shorter hospital stay, resulting in less postoperative pain and improved postoperative recovery.

Driven by the substantial improvement in medical quality enabled by surgical robots, their adoption has been vigorously promoted worldwide, particularly in developed countries. Globally, robot-assisted procedures accounted for 2.8% of all surgeries in 2020, a figure projected to rise to 14% by 2030. In recent years, the application of surgical robots in China has also expanded rapidly. Relevant reports indicate that by 2030, the penetration rate of intelligent devices in China’s orthopedic market alone will surge from less than 5% to over 40%.

“Despite the boundless prospects of the industry, Gu Yushao, Senior Vice President of Medtronic Worldwide and President of Greater China, emphasized that ‘surgical robots are in the early stages of development and cannot yet meet all clinical needs, but the future outlook for the industry remains limitless.’”

At the forum, experts from hospitals expressed higher expectations for surgical robots. Shen Huiyong, President of the Eighth Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, pointed out that many existing spinal surgery robots have only made some improvements in procedures such as pedicle screw placement, but have not yet achieved a significant qualitative leap or reached a level capable of overturning doctors’ traditional perceptions. Ding Wenyuan, a spinal surgeon, noted that although current surgical robots are equipped with human–machine interaction features such as mechanical sensing, feedback, and augmented reality, they are still far from allowing surgeons to control them with complete ease and precision. Liang Junbo, Director of Taizhou Enze Medical Center (Group), also expressed the hope that surgical robots could become more miniaturized, incorporate flexible operational capabilities, and even enable remote-controlled robotic surgery.

Innovation is imperative. However, surgical robotics entails high technical barriers and operational complexity; the journey from technology to product and ultimately to clinical application is a long-term process that requires continuous validation, iteration, and refinement.

“Medical robots have different functions and modes, bearing distinct historical missions.” Cited Zhou Yue, Director of the Department of Orthopedics at the Second Affiliated Hospital of Army Medical University, the currently most prevalent robots in clinical practice are master-slave systems, where surgeons operate and guide them to complete surgeries. These robots do not require any intelligence; surgeons merely leverage their dexterity. In the future, however, intelligent surgical robots will become mainstream. Such robots must not only surpass surgeons in navigation and robotic arm capabilities but, more importantly, possess robust self-learning abilities.

The Mazor X surgical robot is a typical example of achieving an intelligent leap. After 20 years of development and three product iterations, the new generation of Mazor X robots, in addition to the navigation robotic arms possessed by traditional surgical robots, features a comprehensive AI-driven surgical design: it leverages AI to create predictable preoperative plans using CT data, executes precise positioning through robotic arms, and integrates Medtronic navigation technology to achieve full-process visualization.

In Zhou Yue’s view, surgical robots should not only extend the capabilities of surgeons’ eyes and hands but also augment their cognitive functions. “The surgical robots we envision should assist physicians with preoperative diagnosis, rapidly generate preoperative plans, support intraoperative maneuvers, and ultimately aid in clinical decision-making,” he emphasized. He noted that surgical robots, carrying such high expectations, integrate cutting-edge technologies including artificial intelligence (AI), cloud computing, 5G, and virtual reality. Their innovation and development constitute a systematic, multidimensional “engineering” endeavor that requires collaborative efforts from all stakeholders. Consequently, accelerating independent innovation and commercialization in this industry urgently demands deep integration among academia, industry, research institutions, and healthcare providers.

In recent years, Chinese surgical robot companies have been undergoing rapid incubation and growth. As pioneers among domestic enterprises, Xu Kai, founder of Beijing Surgerii Technology Co., Ltd., and Wang Yu, founder of Beijing Rosenbot Technology Co., Ltd., are both entrepreneurs and university professors. In their view, surgical robots, as high-tech products integrating multiple disciplines, require greater collaborative efforts among industry, academia, research institutions, and medical practitioners to transform them into revolutionary therapeutic devices that standardize surgical procedures and homogenize treatment outcomes.

As an innovative technology, the surgical robotics industry, like all emerging industries, has its own growth and development cycles. Currently in the early stages of development, the surgical robotics industry still requires high technical costs, R&D costs, and time investments, making it heavily reliant on greater policy and capital support.

“From ‘Made in China 2025’ to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology’s 14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Medical Equipment Industry, as well as the National Health Commission’s 14th Five-Year Plan for the Construction of Clinical Specialty Capabilities, each major national plan includes specific provisions on robotics. There is no doubt about the support for the robotics industry from the central government to various ministries,” said Yang Jianlong, Deputy Secretary-General of the China Association of Medical Equipment and Director of the Academic Exchange and Education Training Department. He stated that relevant enterprises should seize the valuable opportunity presented by national policy support for the industry and strive to address the challenges currently facing their development.

In terms of capital, investment and financing in China’s surgical robotics industry have also accelerated significantly. The number of deals rose from one in 2013 to 32 in 2021, with total funding across the sector exceeding RMB 3 billion. The rise of emerging companies such as Surgerii, Changmugu, Yuanhua Intelligence, Ruilong Nuofu, and Jianjia Robotics has been backed by prominent investors including SoftBank, Sequoia China, Shunwei Capital, and Meituan Longzhu.

In the secondary market, surgical robots also created the highest IPO event in the medical device industry in 2021: MicroPort MedBot’s market capitalization once exceeded HK$40 billion, and other companies such as Edge Medical are also gradually moving towards IPOs.

In this regard, experts in the investment sector believe that a significant portion of domestic healthcare spending and capital has historically been consumed by medical consumables, particularly high-value consumables, while the value of advanced therapeutic equipment, represented by surgical robots, has not been adequately recognized. Currently, surgical robots have garnered substantial attention from both academic and clinical perspectives and have demonstrated certain health economic values. Over the next 5–10 years, surgical robots are expected to gain increasing market acceptance.

Policy and capital support have served as catalysts for the industry’s inception, while innovation in payment mechanisms provides the momentum for its sustained development. Currently, China’s medical insurance policies regarding surgical robots remain ambiguous. Although certain provinces and municipalities have included surgical robot procedures in their medical insurance coverage, others have imposed price caps on such procedures.

“At present, how to implement reasonable pricing is a topic of common concern not only for hospitals but also for the entire industry,” pointed out Gu Jianying, Vice President of Zhongshan Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University. She highlighted that surgical robots have played a significant role in the development of smart hospitals, yet the issue of their reimbursement and pricing remains unresolved.

In response, Yang Jianlong stated that the previous pricing model was more suitable for mature technologies, whereas emerging products and technologies require adjustments and innovation. “We need to establish a sound policy and market environment and work together to address challenges on the policy front.”

For this reason, the surgical robotics industry still needs to explore more innovative payment models.

As a crucial payer in the future healthcare industry, commercial insurance can play a significant role in covering high-precision drugs, high-value consumables, and advanced innovative therapies (such as surgical robots), particularly where these fall outside the scope of basic medical insurance reimbursement and patients face financial burdens. Yang Su, General Manager of the Health Insurance Division at Magnesium Health, stated that the city-specific supplemental health insurance plans (known as “Huimin Bao”) that have emerged across various regions in recent years could also consider including surgical robots within their coverage.

As Lin Mao, Senior Business Director of Medtronic’s Intelligent Devices and Neurosurgery Division, stated, for surgical robots, safety and efficacy form the foundation, akin to the starting point of a road; efficiency and minimally invasive capabilities determine the overall market size, comparable to the width of the road; while economic viability dictates the potential for sustainable development, much like the length of the road. Only by excelling in all aspects—safety and efficacy, efficiency, minimally invasive techniques, and economic viability—can the path for surgical robots extend ever further.