iRobot sweeping, mopping China

Cerda said that all of iRobot's manufacturing was based in China and recently the company has been doing more design in China too. The company estimated it pumped up to $100 million into R&D last year and there would be more in the future.

"The capability of robot design has improved significantly over the past few years, so we are leveraging that," Cerda said.

Cerda said that China has tremendous talent and infrastructure to support the robot industry.

"We want to lead in the premier end market in China, and we want to lead through increasing intelligence," Cerda added.

"We're expanding our engineering capabilities at our Guangzhou office and we recently built a test lab there," Angle said.

When it comes to the recent trade disputes between China and the US, Cerda added although the consumer robotic industry has not been affected by the tariffs imposed by China as well as the US, he hopes the situation will not be escalated and the two nations can settle the disputes by communication.

The company was founded in 1990 by MIT roboticists, including Colin Angle.

Although its China head office opened in Shanghai in September 2016, iRobot started its business in the country as early as the late 1990s by working with US toy manufacturer Hasbro in Guangzhou to build robot toys.