There are only 5 markets for industrial robots that matter: China, Germany, Japan, US, and SK. The Chinese market is larger than the rest combined so foreign expansion should not be a priority/benchmark at all. German and Japan are both have their own industrial robot producers and will favor their own products. US will move to block Chinese market access the moment Chinese robots start taking significant market share. So the only realistic market for expansion is SK, which is by far the smallest of the relevant markets. Goal should only be to supply the Chinese market with competitive and cost-effective products in order to further enhance competitiveness of Chinese manufacturing, as industrial robots should be viewed as an input / intermediate good. Foreign markets are irrelevant.
@tacoburger
I think there is another way of looking at it.
We can clearly see that Chinese-made industrial robots will be the lowest cost and highest performance for more robot categories as time goes on. Given the size of the Chinese market (larger than the rest of the world combined), we will see a virtuous cycle where more robot sales = more revenue = more R&D spending to develop better robots = more sales.
If German, Japanese and US companies don't use Chinese robots, their companies will have higher manufacturing costs.
So they will lose out on manufacturing to Chinese companies using Chinese robots.
Taken to its logical conclusion, if superior Chinese industrial robots are only available in China, that means overseas factories will tend to go bankrupt, and that factory activity end up in China.
So yes, foreign sales of Chinese robots should be an afterthought.