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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. After a thorough discussion of the available sources, people are divided about whether they are sufficient to establish notability. There are valid reasons for both points of view, such that I can't determine whose arguments are stronger. But in terms of numbers, we have 7 delete to 3 keep (including a "weak" keep"). This is above the two-thirds threshold that I use as a benchmark for rough consensus, ceteris paribus. Sandstein 08:56, 1 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Elephant Robotics

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Elephant Robotics (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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Elephant Robotics

Non-notable corporation that does not satisfy corporate notability or general notability. Naïve Google search shows that the company uses social media, and shows robotic elephants. Article was moved from article space to draft space by User:Joseywales1961 as not ready for article space, but has since been moved back to article space, and is still not ready for article space. With no independent coverage, it is not clear whether it will be ready for article space, but likely not. Neither of the editors who have worked on it have worked on anything else. There are no footnotes, only three external links, one of which is their own web site, and one of which does not mention the company.

Number Reference Remarks Independent Significant Reliable Secondary
1 Elephant Robotics Corporate web site No No No
2 Forbes 30 Asians Under 30 30 Asians Under 30, does not mention Elephant Robotics and so completely useless Yes No Yes No
3 Forbes Appears to be a press release No No Yes No
Robert McClenon (talk) 18:38, 10 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per the significant coverage in multiple independent reliable sources.
    1. 杜莎 (2019). "大象机器人：软件与算法是机器人创新的灵魂" [Elephant Robotics: Software and algorithms are the soul of robot innovation]. 汽车与配件 (in Chinese). No. 17. Archived from the original on 2021-12-13. Retrieved 2021-12-13.
    2. 黄勇; 李路遥; 李路遥 (2018-11-24). "协作机器人市场风头正劲，大象机器人瞄准汽车零配件行业" [The collaborative robot market is gaining momentum, Elephant Robotics targets the auto parts industry] (in Chinese). ifenxi. Archived from the original on 2021-12-13. Retrieved 2021-12-13.

      According to this page from PitchBook Data about ifenxi, "Developer of a platform providing equity and industry research in China. The company's platform gathers experts from various industries to provide investors with personalized investment research services."

    3. Chai Hua (2017-04-07). "'Elephant' joins the robotic revolution". China Daily. Archived from the original on 2021-12-13. Retrieved 2021-12-13.
    4. Kirton, David (2020-06-14). Goh, Brenda; Gibbs, Edwina (eds.). "Crunch time for China's robot startups as pandemic brings pain and opportunities". Reuters. Archived from the original on 2021-12-13. Retrieved 2021-12-13.

      The article includes quotes from people affiliated with the company but also includes negative coverage about the company: "Elephant Robotics’ main business is the automation of factory assembly lines but revenue has plunged by a third this year due to the coronavirus, leading the company to cut staff by a fifth."

    5. Bogue, Robert (2020-12-08). "The Chinese robot industry". Industrial Robot. Emerald Publishing. Retrieved 2021-12-13.

      The article notes: "In addition to Siasun, two of the more important and recently founded Chinese manufacturers are Elephant Robotics and Shenzhen Han’s Robot Co. which both produce ranges of low-payload cobots. Elephant was founded in 2016 and produces the P, C and E Series cobots."

    There is sufficient coverage in reliable sources to allow Elephant Robotics (simplified Chinese: 大象机器人; traditional Chinese: 大像機器人) to pass Wikipedia:Notability#General notability guideline, which requires "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject".

    Cunard (talk) 08:35, 13 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Two points. First off (as has been pointed out to Cunard countless times) the appropriate guideline is WP:NCORP and not WP:GNG and has no answer when it is pointed out that even WP:SNG (a section in GNG) refers explicitly to the strict criteria of NCORP. Secondly, Cunard also well knows that WP:SIRS says that each reference must meet all the criteria, not just pick and chose between the bits that are easier than others. HighKing++ 16:43, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Thoughts on Cunard's sources?
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Extraordinary Writ (talk) 21:07, 17 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment: Most of the article is still unreferenced, even with those new sources in. That's a lead and five short sentences. If that's all we can do, I don't know how anyone can straight-facedly call this "significant coverage". -- asilvering (talk) 22:05, 17 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Weak keep, I would say the 5 references there would just push it across the line. Also considering, there could be more that are not obvious because they are in Chinese language sources. Deathlibrarian (talk) 01:45, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I have added a few more references. There is quite a lot of covereage, though a lot of it is web site based. Deathlibrarian (talk) 02:01, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete WP:NCORP requires multiple sources (at least two) of deep or significant coverage with in-depth information *on the company* and (this bit is important!) containing "Independent Content". "Independent content", in order to count towards establishing notability, must include original and independent opinion, analysis, investigation, and fact checking that are clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated to the subject. That means, nothing that relies on company information or announcements or interviews, etc. None of the references in the article meet the criteria as follows:
    • This from CNKI] is a single sentence using the company's own description of itself which can also be seen in thi sohu.com article. Clearly not "Independent Content" and fails WP:ORGIND
    • This from ChinaDaily.com is a puff piece in which any discussion on the company relies *entirely* on information provided by the company and an interview with one of the founders, Song. There's a bit about the robotics marketplace in general but none of that says anything about the company. Completely fails WP:ORGIND.
    • This from Emerald Insight is a review of the robotic industry in China and covers many aspects of that industry. The topic company is merely mentioned in passing, fails WP:CORPDEPTH
    • This from Reuters features some quotations from Song, one of the founders at the beginning and then goes on to describe how the general robotics market has suffered recently. There is no in-depth information and no "Independent Content", fails both CORPDEPTH and ORGIND
    • This from Forbes is marked as a profile from the original "30 under 30" feature using information provided by the company, fails both CORPDEPTH and ORGIND
    • This from The Verge is a feature on a Kickstarter campaign for a robot cat to be built by the topic company. There is no in-depth information on the company and all of the information about the product is provided by the company, fails both CORPDEPTH and ORGIND. Similarly, this from TechCrunch is also about the robot cat and fails NCORP for the exact same reasons.
In summary, not a single reference meet NCORP and I have been unable to find any others that meet our criteria for notability. Topic fails WP:NCORP. HighKing++ 16:43, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Elephant Robotics passes both Wikipedia:Notability#General notability guideline and Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies)#Primary criteria. Per Wikipedia:Notability#Article content does not determine notability, that the article would benefit from being further sourced and expanded from the sources presented in this AfD does not mean the subject is non-notable. It is standard journalistic practice for journalists to include quotes from people affiliated with the company. That does not make the articles become non-independent. These sources provide significant coverage about the subject:
    1. 黄勇; 李路遥; 李路遥 (2018-11-24). "协作机器人市场风头正劲，大象机器人瞄准汽车零配件行业" [The collaborative robot market is gaining momentum, Elephant Robotics targets the auto parts industry] (in Chinese). ifenxi. Archived from the original on 2021-12-13. Retrieved 2021-12-13.

      The article notes from Google Translate: "Established in 2016, Elephant Robotics is a collaborative robot design, R&D and production manufacturer that independently researches and develops robot bodies, control systems, operating systems and software solutions, mainly for the auto parts industry. ... Elephant Robot has two major product series-Elephant series and Cat series. Both series of products are aimed at the auto parts industry. Application scenarios include workpiece loading and unloading, assembly, functional testing, packaging, etc. ... At p1resent, the main customers of Elephant Robotics are Tier 1 and Tier 2 suppliers in the auto parts industry. On the one hand, Elephant Robotic obtains customers through direct sales, and generally provides solutions on its own in the Pearl River Delta and Yangtze River Delta regions. On the other hand, it can also cooperate with system integrators. Elephant Robotics only provides robots, and the integrator will carry out system integration and cooperate to create a complete set of solutions."

    2. Chai Hua (2017-04-07). "'Elephant' joins the robotic revolution". China Daily. Archived from the original on 2021-12-13. Retrieved 2021-12-13.

      The journalist profiles the company and extensively discusses its initial product, Elephant. The article includes quotes from a founder of the company. It is standard journalistic practice to include quotes from the subject of the article. That does not make the article non-independent. The article notes that Joey Song founded Elephant Robotics in Shenzhen in 2016 and created "Elephant", which "consists of a "head" to detect obstacles, a body to move around and the most important part - a robotic arm to pick up and place objects." The article further notes, "Last year, Song and business partner Kirin Wu founded the startup. Their creation of snack-stealing and automatic hotpot robots won the support of the world's largest hardware incubator HAX Accelerator. Since then, they've started to focus on industrial robots. To get familiar with the market, they had spent every weekend in different factories around Shenzhen for about four months."

    3. The following sources provide less significant coverage of the subject but still contribute to notability. From Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies)#No inherent notability: "When evaluating the notability of organizations or products, please consider whether they have had any significant or demonstrable effects on culture, society, entertainment, athletics, economies, history, literature, science, or education." The Emerald Publishing article calls Elephant Robotics one "of the more important and recently founded Chinese manufacturers" which contributes to notability as the source believes the company has had a significant effect in the robotics industry. The Reuters article covers how Elephant Robotics had to lay people off owing to falling revenue which is negative coverage of the subject that the company would not want highlighted. There is no evidence that the Forbes article used information provided by the company rather than independent research by Forbes.
    Cunard (talk) 01:10, 20 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Response Yeah, I see the standard journalistic practice for journalists to include quotes from people affiliated with the company reasoning a lot but it hardly ever stands up to scrutiny. Either journalists end up relying *entirely* on information provided by the company (with no original and independent opinion, analysis, investigation, and fact checking that are clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated to the subject) or the article regurgitates the information from the company's website and product literature.
  1. You've included a number of quotes from the ifenxi.com article. The small paragraph which you've included that starts with "Established in 2016" is the standard company description which can be found in other articles. The next paragraph in the article introduces us to "Song Junyi", the founder and further down the author provides detailed technical information prefaced with "According to Song Junji" and later another reference to information provided by the founder "Song Junyi estimates". Clearly, all of the detailed information was provided by the company and/or the founder and there is nothing in the article that is "clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated to the subject". Therefore fails WP:ORGIND.
  2. I've already commented on the puff piece from ChinaDaily.com in which all of the discussion and information on the company relies *entirely* on information provided by the company and an interview with one of the founders, Song. There's also a bit about the robotics marketplace in general but none of that says is relevant to establishing notability of the company. Completely fails WP:ORGIND. There is nothing in this article *about the company* that can be clearly identified and is clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated with the company. Also fails ORGIND.
  3. Trying to justify a single sentence where a journalist gushes that the topic company is "one of the more important and recently founded Chinese manufacturers" as a measure of a "demonstrable effect on culture, society, entertainment...etc" is pretty lame and totally ignores WP:SIRS which says that each reference must meet *all* of the criteria for establishing notability which includes CORPDEPTH and ORGIND. It is also difficult (mind boggling in fact) to justify a "recently founded" robotics company as having any profound impact on society to the extent you're imagining. And just to dwell for a second on the full meaning of WP:SIRS ... it means that each reference is examined in isolation from other references and that each reference must meet all of the criteria including multiple sources (at least two) of deep or significant coverage with in-depth information *on the company* and (this bit is important!) containing "Independent Content" which is defined as original and independent opinion, analysis, investigation, and fact checking that are clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated to the subject. Plucking single sentences from articles which clearly rely on information provided by the company and/or the founder or cutting out paragraphs from such articles where the author doesn't explicitly state "The founder says" or "According to the company" (but the rest of the article makes it clear that the article relies entirely on information provided) is disingenuous, disruptive and a waste of other editors' time to have to point this out to you just about every single time you comment at an NCORP-related AfD.
None of those references meet NCORP. HighKing++ 12:17, 22 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Missvain (talk) 01:57, 25 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Chumpih, could you point to the parts of those articles that meets WP:ORGIND? You say those articles seem to satisfy "Independent" but what do you mean exactly by "Independent"? Have you identified parts of those articles that contain original and independent opinion, analysis, investigation, and fact checking that are clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated to the subject?? HighKing++ 17:00, 28 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@HighKing: The Reuters piece features companies other than Elephant. Reuters is reliable. It's not the direct content of the company, and it's not the trade journal. The piece dwells upon the impact of Covid on the market, and has quite a few paragraphs with Elephant as the subject. I'm not currently aware of anything that suggests this is unoriginal. The piece is attributed to the author David Kirton, so unless there's evidence of plagiarism, it's likely original.
The China Daily piece talks mostly about Elephant, although it does include commentary from a prof. of Robotics in Shenzhen, and compares the company's fortunes with reports from ABI. While the piece is overwhelmingly upbeat, it looks to contrast the new stuff they're producing with traditional equipment. China Daily is probably reliable on this topic, since it's nothing to do with toeing the gov't line. Again, I'm not currently aware of anything that suggests this is unoriginal. The piece is attributed to the author Chai Hua, and again, unless there's evidence of plagiarism, it's likely original. Chumpih. (talk) 22:15, 28 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Chumpih, you've clarified your decision for me. I'm not focused on whether the publications are reliable or not - I assume they are. But in response to your explanation, I would say that NCORP requires (SIRS) that each article/reference contains "Independent Content" (ORGIND) that is in-depth (CORPDEPTH) *on the company*. So when you've an article that discusses a marketplace and the impact of Covid (which may or may not be Independent Content), it is irrelevant unless it is directly about the topic company. The part in the Reuters piece that is about the company is generic and is a standard description with the same information that can be found on the website and in multiple articles and announcements. We will disagree on the China Daily piece also - for me it is clearly a puff piece based entirely on information provided by the company and/or the execs. The article is peppered with references to this fact (e.g. "Song notes", "says Song", "Song believes", etc) and it fails ORGIND since the in-depth facts/information don't appear to be *clearly* attributable to a source unaffiliated with the topic company. Your argument that the piece shows no signs of being "unoriginal" is a strawman argument as it is entirely possible for a journalist to write an "original" piece based on an interview but still fail ORGIND. HighKing++ 14:22, 30 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks HighKing for your rationale. Re. WP:CORPDEPTH the list of qualifiers is an 'or', not an 'and', so to qualify a piece should provide any of those bits of info. Per that section, we don't want a WP:PERMASTUB. For the Reuters piece, we have commentary, and the subject of many paragraphs in that piece is Elephant. Re. the China Daily, agree it's peppered with quotes from a company exec and is overwhelmingly upbeat, but there is a smattering evidence to suggest intellectual independence, specifically where the professor and the research are cited. Chumpih t 15:00, 30 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Chumpih, re CORPDEPTH, yes the list of qualifiers is an example list and doesn't require all of those elements. Similarly, an example list is contained in ORGIND. And there are other sections in NCORP too including WP:SIRS which says that each reference must meet all of the criteria. I think we both agree on all of that but no harm in clarifying our understanding. So, in the Reuters piece, you say it contains "commentary" (which needs to be about the company in order to meet CORPDEPTH) - but can you point out something specific? I am unable to identify anything that is deep or significant 'commentary' about the company and is clearly "intellectually independent". Similarly, you say there's a "smattering of evidence" to suggest the China Daily piece meet ORGIND, specifically where the professor and the research are cited - but the professor doesn't even mention the topic company nor does the research, its just generic commentary on the entire robotics market. HighKing++ 16:50, 30 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Nice one HighKing. Re. Reuters, we have Elephant Robotics’ main business is the automation of factory assembly lines but revenue has plunged by a third this year due to the coronavirus, leading the company to cut staff by a fifth. which is clearly commentary, bordering on analysis.
Re. the China Daily yep, smattering. It provides context etc, but not much more. But it didn't have to be included, so it's not unreasonable to infer some intellectual independence from that. Chumpih t 18:04, 30 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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