{"id":450000,"date":"2026-02-28T09:05:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T09:05:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/450000\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T09:05:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T09:05:10","slug":"bmw-to-put-humanoid-robots-on-production-line-at-german-plant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/450000\/","title":{"rendered":"BMW to put humanoid robots on production line at German plant"},"content":{"rendered":"

Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free<\/p>\n

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.<\/p>\n

BMW will put humanoids on the factory line at one of its German plants, as Europe\u2019s struggling auto industry turns to AI-powered robots to bring down labour and manufacturing costs.<\/p>\n

The pilot at BMW<\/a>\u2019s plant in Leipzig will be the first time the company has deployed humanoids at one of its European factories following a trial in the US last year.<\/p>\n

BMW joins Tesla, Hyundai and a slew of other carmakers that are betting on growth in the humanoid market, which Morgan Stanley estimates could reach $5tn by 2050, led by widespread use in China.<\/p>\n

The automotive industry is aiming to use its engineering expertise in robotics as a driver of new revenue as well as bringing down labour costs and boosting productivity. <\/p>\n

In Leipzig, a single-digit number of humanoids, supplied by Swedish firm Hexagon, will be used on assembly lines and the manufacture of high-voltage batteries for electric vehicles<\/a> where employees have to wear cumbersome protective clothing. <\/p>\n

The project is similar in scale to a pilot carried out by BMW at its plant in Spartanburg, South Carolina. At the US factory robots placed sheet metal parts for welding used in more than 30,000 vehicles over 10 months, working in 10-hour shifts five days a week, the company said.<\/p>\n

The task was \u201cparticularly demanding in terms of speed and accuracy while also being physically exhausting\u201d for employees, said BMW.<\/p>\n

\u201cDigitalisation improves the competitiveness of our production \u2014 here in Europe and worldwide,\u201d said BMW production chief Milan Nedeljkovi\u0107, who will become the company\u2019s chief executive in May.<\/p>\n

The project would be launched this year following a test deployment in April, the company said. Adding humanoids to production was a complement to existing plant automation and would help \u201crelieve employees and further improve working conditions\u201d, the company said. <\/p>\n

In time, BMW could also take on more tasks currently performed by suppliers using humanoids. \u201cThis gives us opportunity to do more production in-house,\u201d said Michael Str\u00f6bel, BMW\u2019s head of process management. <\/p>\n

The auto industry has increasingly looked to humanoids as a way to upgrade its factories and as a potential new market for its products. <\/p>\n

Hyundai is testing the use of humanoids in its factories, with its robotics unit Boston Dynamics this year revealing a new version of its humanoid designed to work in the company\u2019s production plants from 2028. <\/p>\n

Toyota also announced last week that it would use humanoids at a plant in Canada.<\/p>\n

Mercedes-Benz last year began using humanoids to transport materials on the factory floor and carry out quality checks in its Berlin plant. Ford has also tested humanoids at its Cologne site.<\/p>\n

For auto suppliers, whose traditional markets have shrunk in the face of cheap Chinese competition and weak demand, robotics presents another field where their expertise in precision engineering can be redeployed. <\/p>\n

Parts-maker Schaeffler has signed agreements with humanoid start-ups including Germany\u2019s Neura Robotics and Britain\u2019s Humanoid to purchase hundreds of robots and supply components for the machines.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":450001,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-450000","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-technology","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}