Most production robots in the world will end up in China in two years, as more automation units are used in electronics and car plants, a global industry association disclosed this week.

The International Federation of Robotics said the construction of more car plants in China and rising wages would drive the doubling of industrial robots to 428,000 by 2017.

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The chief of the Germany-based IFR, Gudrun Litzenberger, said it would make more sense for manufacturers to invest in more robots to improve quality and to be more productive.

She added the auto industry was leading the current stage of automation but in a couple of years, the electronics industry will drive the demand for robots.

China is the largest market in the $9.5 billion world robot industry but it is far behind other more industrialized countries in terms of robot density. China has only about 30 robots for every 10,000 workers in production plants, compared with 282 in Germany, 152 in the United States, 323 in Japan and 437 in South Korea.

Robot makers in Japan are still the biggest suppliers, with more than half of total sales, but Chinese makers are growing fast, selling one in four robots. U.S. and European manufacturers account for the rest.

The car industry is so far the biggest buyer of robots in China, making up nearly 4 in 10 existing robots, as the country is both the globe's largest car market and its biggest manufacturing site.

European carmakers such as Daimler and Volkswagen, which heavily invested in China, are taking their suppliers for robots with them.

Analysts expect electronics companies take their cue from their car-making counterparts. Taiwan's manufacturing titan Foxconn, which churns out Apple iPads and iPhones among other electronics goods, is already producing its own Foxbot robots and using automation units from other suppliers.