Dive Brief:
- Swiss robotics company ABB is investing $20 million to increase production at its Auburn Hills, Michigan robotics headquarters and manufacturing site, the company announced last week.
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Renovations are currently underway, which won’t include expanding the facility’s footprint, but instead focus on “modernizing existing space” to increase production capacity by 30%, the company said in an email.
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The project is slated for completion in November, with a focus on better serving customers in the EV, healthcare, packaging and logistics sectors, according to the release.
Dive Insight:
The new equipment at the Auburn Hills facility will use digitally connected manufacturing cells, with production performed by mobile robots.
Robots at the site will take on tasks such as screw driving, assembling and material handling, which ABB said would relieve workers from such assignments.
The project will create 72 jobs supporting ABB’s robotics packaging and logistics headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, as well as at its robotics life sciences and health care hub at the Texas Medical Center in Houston, Texas.
With completion of the renovation, nearly 90% of robots delivered to customers in the US, Canada, Mexico and South America will soon be made in Auburn Hills.
ABB is pushing to increase production of its robots as more companies look to adopt the technology. In a survey the company conducted last year, it found 43% of respondents planned to use automation and robotics to build supply chain resilience.
“As the global mega trends of labor shortages, uncertainty, the near and reshoring of production, and a desire to operate more sustainably accelerate, more businesses are turning to automation to build resilience while improving efficiency and flexibility,” Sami Atiya, president of ABB Robotics and Discrete Automation, said in a statement.
The same trend is being seen across the industry, with experts noting the technology can help alleviate ongoing labor constraints. Tim Shinbara, vice president and CTO for the Association for Manufacturing Technology, projected that more manufacturers will add automation and robotics to their operations this year.
