Foxconn, the name most commonly heard for producing products like the Apple iPad actually employees over 12 lakh people in its Asian factories. The load is shared by some 10,000 robots at the moment, and Foxconn’s ambitious push towards automation promises as many as 1 million robots working in these factories in the next 3 years.
While the demand for handheld products is on a rise across the globe, Foxconn is busy scaling up their facilities with robots, and perhaps even counter a lot of scaling issues that arise from 1.2 million humans working in these factories. Poor working conditions, leaks of unreleased products / stolen IP (intellectual property) and employee suicides are some issues that Foxconn would tackle by brining in machines. Add to that the ‘efficiency, speed and cost cutting’ that these robots would brings in.
The Taiwanese giant serves leading international names like Apple, Nokia & Nintendo amongst others. The robots are said to be planned for basic tasks like “spraying, welding and assembling” as reported by Xinhuanet, thus replacing a lot of human touch that current handheld manufacturing requires. To us, it points a step towards the future of automation and of course geeky as well!
