Guojin Securities: Technology iteration combined with national standards, and the cooking robot industry has entered a stage of large-scale growth

The Zhitong Finance App learned that Guojin Securities released a research report saying that the commercialization of cooking robots will effectively relieve the employment pain points of catering companies, optimize the kitchen manpower structure, and enable catering companies to reduce costs and increase efficiency. Promote the digital upgrading of catering companies. The cooking robot collaborates with other intelligent catering devices to establish a closed loop of full-link data, which can form a three-terminal interconnection of orders, kitchen, and operation, and promote the transformation of the catering industry from experience-driven to data-driven. In the long run, it will force collaborative upgrading of the industrial chain and promote the expansion of standardized food production by upstream suppliers in the industrial chain. The C-side targets the four major groups of young people living alone, working families, middle-aged and elderly people, and renting small apartments. Relying on the steady expansion of lazy people's economy, healthy consumption, and smart home penetration.

Guojin Securities's main views are as follows:

Technology iteration combined with the implementation of national standards, and the industry entered a stage of large-scale growth.

The cooking robot is a fully automatic cooking device that integrates multi-dimensional temperature sensing, AI cooking algorithms, closed-loop automatic temperature control, and bionic mechanical stir-fry. It can independently standardize the entire process of feeding, heat adjustment, quantitative seasoning, stir-frying, and pouring. In October 2025, GB/T 46718-2025 “Commercial Intelligent Cooking Machine” was released as a national standard to fill the gap in industry standards. After going through the 2018-2020 technical verification period and the 2021-2023 commercial pilot period, the commercialization of restaurant chains will be fully rolled out in 2024: Bawan's more than 1,000 stores across the country will all use self-developed cooking robots, and the small vegetable garden plans to spend 100 million yuan to purchase 2,000 units. Oak Deer Technology and Nonstop Technology have each received more than 500 million yuan in financing since 2024, forming a virtuous cycle between commercialization and capital investment. According to NCBD Food Collection estimates, the market size of cooking robots will reach 3.81 billion yuan in 2025, with a year-on-year growth rate of more than 20%. It is expected to exceed 10 billion yuan in 2030, and the CAGR is about 28.5% from 2026-2030.

B-side cost reduction and efficiency just needed to be backed up, constituting the core growth of the industry.

The main application scenarios of the B-side are chain restaurants, group meals, prepared food packages, and special institutions. According to NCBD Food Collection estimates, commercial cooking robots will account for 94.6% of revenue in 2025, making them the absolute mainstay of industry demand. On the demand side, the national chef gap has reached 3 million, and the employment gap needs to be filled urgently. Labor costs account for 28.6%, while the average net interest rate in the restaurant industry is only 0.3%, so the demand for cost reduction and efficiency is remarkable. According to estimates by the Red Food Industry Research Institute, it is estimated that in 2028, the penetration rate of cooking robots on group meals and fast food tracks will rise to 50%. Back stores equipped with stir-fry robots will increase 2-3 times in terms of manpower efficiency and meal delivery efficiency. The return cycle for a single store with 3 units is about 8.4 months.

Driven by the C-end lazy economy and healthy diet, there is plenty of room for expansion at low prices.

The C-side targets the four major groups of young people living alone, working families, middle-aged and elderly people, and renting small apartments. Relying on the steady expansion of lazy people's economy, healthy consumption, and smart home penetration. The household market is still being explored. According to NCBD Food Collection estimates, household cooking robots will only account for 5.4% of sales in 2025. The four largest groups of young people living alone, working families, middle-aged and elderly people, and renting small apartments continue to expand, which may bring about C-side increases. C-end consumers are highly price sensitive. According to data from Aowei Cloud Network, the 1000-2000 yuan price segment accounts for nearly 30% of sales, and the 1000 yuan lightweight entry-level model is the mainstream choice.

The competitive landscape is divided, and various types of enterprises compete differently.

Vertical professional cooking robot companies are represented by Oak Technology, Nonstop Technology, Utesmart Chef, and Bowan, which control the basic B-side commercial market; smart equipment cross-border enterprises are mainly Yunji Technology, Topbon Co., Ltd. and SEMIKRON, which rely on motion control, cluster scheduling, and electromagnetic cooking technology to enter across borders, focusing on scenarios such as hotels and group meals; traditional home appliance giants are represented by Supor, Joyang Co., Ltd. and Tianke, which focus on the C-end household market with mature supply chains and channel advantages. In 2025, leading companies in the industry will significantly lead in shipping volume. With the further stabilization of customers and channels, the Matthew effect may continue to strengthen, and the differentiated competition pattern of various enterprise groups is remarkable.

The cooking robot reconstructs the kitchen model to enable standardization and digital upgrading of catering.

The commercialization of cooking robots will effectively relieve the employment pain points of catering companies, optimize the kitchen manpower structure, and enable catering companies to reduce costs and increase efficiency. Promote the digital upgrading of catering companies. The cooking robot collaborates with other intelligent catering devices to establish a closed loop of full-link data, which can form a three-terminal interconnection of orders, kitchen, and operation, and promote the transformation of the catering industry from experience-driven to data-driven. In the long run, it will force collaborative upgrading of the industrial chain and promote the expansion of standardized food production by upstream suppliers in the industrial chain.

Risk warning: industry competition intensifies, application scenarios fall short of expectations, restaurant chain expansion falls short of expectations