Hyundai placed a big bet on the future of humanoid robotics within its automotive manufacturing operations and it’s reportedly starting to get impatient with the results so far.
In 2021, Hyundai acquired a majority stake in Boston Dynamics for $1.1 billion in a deal designed to “leverage each other’s respective strengths in manufacturing, logistics, construction and automation.” The plan was to create a robotics value chain, from robot component manufacturing to smart logistics solutions while supporting Boston Dynamics’ continued product expansion.
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Last year, Hyundai promised to make a $21 billion investment in U.S. manufacturing, a capital layout that would be used in part to purchase "tens of thousands of robots" from Boston Dynamics.
But according to a new report from Semafor, the robot maker is still only making about four of its Atlas humanoid robots per month. At that rate, it would take more than 200 years to hit the 10,000 robot goal.
A boost to production volume appears to be on the horizon though, as Boston Dynamics is reportedly planning to open a new manufacturing facility in the coming months. A spokesperson for the company told the publication that the upcoming factory will give it the ability to mass manufacture Atlas robots, which are in the process of switching from the prototype to the production version.
Still, multiple executives including former CEO Robert Playter and CTO Aaron Saunders have reportedly been pushed out by Hyundai, which has grown worried about losing ground in the robotics race against other automakers.
Those competitors include Toyota, which has partnered with Agility to deploy humanoid bots to support manufacturing at its largest plant outside of Japan, and Tesla, which is developing its own Optimus humanoid robot with plans to produce one million of them a year.
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