Is that a ‘Star Wars’ droid? New humanoid robots to work at SC BMW plant. What to know

These were the droids BMW was looking for.

Robotics company Figure announced on Thursday it had made a commercial agreement with BMW Manufacturing to bring its general purpose, humanoid robots into automotive production at the Spartanburg, S.C. plant. According to a press release from Figure, the humanoid robots provide automation for difficult, unsafe or tedious tasks in manufacturing, which gives employees time to focus on skills and other work that cannot be automated.

“Single-purpose robotics have saturated the commercial market for decades, but the potential of general purpose robotics is completely untapped,” Brett Adcock, Founder and CEO of Figure, said in the press release. “Figure’s robots will enable companies to increase productivity, reduce costs, and create a safer and more consistent environment.”

The BMW plant employs 11,000 workers at its 8 million square-foot campus in Spartanburg and assembles the BMW X3, X4, X5, X6, X7, and XM Sports Activity Vehicles and Coupes and their variants.

In the first phase of the agreement, Figure plans to identify initial use cases to apply the robots in automotive production. Steve Wilson, media communications specialist with BMW Manufacturing, wrote in a Thursday email to The State that the plant would use just one robot in the first phase. Once that is done, more robots will be deployed at the South Carolina plant.

“We are investigating several tasks across the plant to help improve ergonomics and safety,” Wilson wrote.

Wilson added that BMW had no timetable yet for when the robots would be added to the plant.

The two companies also plan to explore other avenues beyond the humanoid robots, such as artificial intelligence, robot control, manufacturing virtualization and robot integration, the press release states.

“The automotive industry, and with it the production of vehicles, is evolving rapidly,” Robert Engelhorn, President and CEO of BMW Manufacturing, said in the press release. “BMW Manufacturing is committed to integrating innovative technologies in our production systems to drive our future forward as an industry leader and innovator. The use of general purpose robot solutions has the potential to make productivity more efficient, to support the growing demands of our consumers, and to enable our team to focus on the transformation ahead of us.”