Foxconn to Replace a Portion of its Workers with 1 Million Robots

[MacRumors]

Xinhuanet reports that Foxconn will be replacing some of its workers with 1 million robots in the next three years to cut rising labor costs and improve efficiency.

The robots will be used to do simple and routine work such as spraying, welding and assembling which are now mainly conducted by workers, said Gou

The company currently has 10,000 robots and employs 1.2 million people. It's not clear how many jobs will be replaced by the robots.

Foxconn is Apple's primary partner in assembling the popular iPod, iPad, and iPhone lines and has been criticized for poor working conditions that may have contributed to a series of suicides at the plant.

In April, Engadget had previously pointed to this concept model FRIDA by ABB as the likely models for Foxconn, though the new report doesn't specify.

Article Link: Foxconn to Replace a Portion of its Workers with 1 Million Robots

 

[Sixtafoua]

Not sure if this is good or bad news for foxconn's employees.

 

[FrankieTDouglas]

Poor working conditions, replaced by unemployment.

 

[d4rkc4sm]

in video, what's up the diagonal goat se gestures

 

[bokdol]

so skynet begins in china.

 

[mnsportsgeek]

Lesson taught... Go to college

 

[Silver Box]

Reminds me of

Hmm, a robot city. Anyone for renaming Foxconn 'Zero One'?

 

[flopticalcube]

Inevitable is the end point of the manufacturing process. Just as it was for agriculture before it, although I think we may have gone a bit too far there. Not good for the employees of Foxconn but neither where the mechanized mills for the Luddites. Luckily humans can adapt.

 

[lilcosco08]

In other news, Foxconn will be changing its name to Aperture Science

 

[576316]

Unemployment aid

Aren't we meant to be creating more jobs? Not taking them away.

 

[Tilpots]

Maybe the layed off employees can get a job building the robots that replaced them.

 

[Neodym]

I think the images of that humanoid robot prototype are grossly misleading!

Industrial robots are very strictly form-follows-function. The development of universal humanoid robots is just not there yet (which besides means they would be far too expensive for industrial use at a scale as big as here with Foxconn), so Foxconn will simply buy standard robots that won't even remotely look humanoid...

 

[bloijs]

But the real question is: how well can they apply thermal paste?

 

[apolloa]

So, will the cost savings these robots will bring be passed on to the consumer then? Or will Apple, Sony etc just profit more?

 

[d4rkc4sm]

Aren't we meant to be creating more jobs? Not taking them away.

take away from chinese, give to swiss. china getting too powerful anyway

 

[0098386]

Robots. Whoa.

I wonder if they have a bending unit?

 

[Epic Xbox Revie]

So, will the cost savings these robots will bring be passed on to the consumer then? Or will Apple, Sony etc just profit more?

We all know the answer to that.

 

[flopticalcube]

take away from chinese, give to swiss. china getting too powerful anyway

Give the Chinese a few years and they will be building their own robots. Original designs, of course.

 

[iJays]

will these robots use iOS?

 

[BornAgainMac]

Androids will assemble the iPhone.

 

[pyn]

To those complaining: maybe we should also stop using word processing software and instead hire scribes to produce any written documents. Oh and while we're at it, let's stop using any mode of automated transportation and hire people to pull us on rickshaws.

 

[liavman]

And this sets in motion the process of Foxconn opening a U.S. manufacturing plant in a few years.

 

[flopticalcube]

And this sets in motion the process of Foxconn opening a U.S. manufacturing plant in a few years.

Total number of employees: 6.

 

[hobo.hopkins]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A5274d Safari/7534.48.3)

So, will the cost savings these robots will bring be passed on to the consumer then? Or will Apple, Sony etc just profit more?

The article says that the introduction of these robots is to combat the rising cost of labour, which means that it is entirely possible that they might not be saving any money. The initial cost of the robots, coupled with the cost to adjust the manufacturing process, could mean that there won't be any savings (or at least not for some time).

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

So, will the cost savings these robots will bring be passed on to the consumer then? Or will Apple, Sony etc just profit more?

Considering how little Foxconn workers get paid and how much these machines likely cost, I expect there will be little savings. To be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if the use of these actually cost a little more. They're not exactly cheap, require maintenance and likely have to be operated in relatively clean environments because of increased wear and tear from contaminants.