How exoskeleton suits are turning car factory personnel into human robots

Wearable technology is dealing with a different meaning in the world of automobiles. As employees age and younger persons shun the idea of focusing on a factory production line, car companies are looking at ways to lighten the strain.

High-tech exoskeletons are being explored by firms including Hyundai Motor, Ford Motor, and General Motors. The technology, primarily developed to help persons who had lost the opportunity to walk or stand by themselves, eases fatigue and aids in preventing injury. It’s particularly useful for repetitive processes that can’t be automated even as robotics makes big inroads into the sector.

All sorts of companies have a “focus on corporate social responsibility and labor protection” and so are making an effort to avoid workplace-related injuries, said Xu Zhenhua, the founder of ULS Robotics, a Shanghai-based firm that delivers exoskeletons for carmakers, airport operators, and other commercial manufacturers.

While the auto industry has already been highly automated, experienced personnel are still necessary for the ultimate general assembly

ULS Robotics is developing three exoskeletons that personnel can wear to carry and lift heavy equipment. One is for the chest muscles, another goes around the waist and the third focuses on the lower limbs. The first two weigh about seven kilograms each and invite a wearer to lift yet another 20 kilograms. They’re powered by a lithium battery that has a life of about six to eight hours.

Mr Xu said the exoskeletons are most readily useful along general assembly lines, which still rely to a degree on manual labor. Just as scooters and shared bicycles have helped resolve the “last mile” problem for e-commerce deliveries and commuters, so too can exoskeletons help fix “the last person” problem on a production line, he said.

GM is testing some of ULS Robotics’ products. Some other clients include China Southern Airlines, Shanghai Pudong AIRPORT TERMINAL and the new Beijing Daxing AIRPORT TERMINAL. Exoskeletons could possibly be especially useful for ground-handling staff, Mr Xu said.

Future Capital Discovery Fund can be an early investor in ULS Robotics. Founding partner Huang Mingming said the exoskeletons fix a problem not only China, however, but the whole world is also facing.

“In the past 30 years, China gained an edge because we'd many young people and a low-cost labor force,” Mr Huang said. “However aging and a declining birthrate started from the first 2010s. As the auto industry has already been highly automated, experienced employees are still needed for the final general assembly. That’s not replaceable.”

South Korea’s Hyundai comes with an exoskeleton to greatly help employees perform overhead tasks and another that becomes chair so employees can complete tasks without bending.

“The population gets older and people working in factories are also older, this means costs related to commercial accidents are on the rise,” said Hyun Dong-jin, the top of Hyundai’s Robotics Lab. “Wearable devices have grown to be important in lowering these costs.”

Hyundai will trial the exoskeletons created by its Hyundai Rotem unit in Korea and plans to ship them to 1 of its factories in Alabama later this year ahead of a worldwide rollout. Eventually, it hopes to sell them to other automakers.

Hyundai isn’t the first carmaker to use exoskeletons - in 2018, Ford said employees in 15 plants who perform repetitive overhead tasks could have assistance from fresh chest muscles exoskeletal technology - nonetheless, it is one of just a few developing them in-house. (Ford partnered with Richmond, California-based Ekso Bionics.)

Within an automated procedure, it’s much easier to discover work inefficiencies and make adjustments

Xu Zhenhua

Mr Hyun said the sensors it’s putting on wearables could also help in Hyundai’s development of autonomous vehicles. The business announced in December it will spend 20 trillion won ($17 billion) over another six years on new technology to make the switch to electric and self-driving cars.

Sensors might help drive human efficiency as well, Mr Xu said. “Within an automated procedure, it’s better to find work inefficiencies and make adjustments,” he said. “It’s harder to know a worker’s status. Wearable equipment can help.”