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The robot never gets tired: Hyundai explains why its Boston Dynamics Atlas
robot is ready to take over factories, but not your home

Date:
Sat, 24 Jan 2026 11:00:00 +0000

Description:
Hyundai and Boston Dynamics revealed plans to build 30,000 humanoid robots
each year. Here's why they think its the future of manufacturing.

FULL STORY

This years Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was awash with humanoid
robots. Brands used little dancing droids to attract crowds to stands, while
amateur teams of engineers conducted impromptu robot-offs in the car park. 

As a result, it was easy to view these often diminutive bits of technology as
a novelty  until, that is, Hyundais 90kg Atlas humanoid robot stomped onto
stage a day before the show floor opened to the public. 

Measuring around 5ft tall, with the ability to reach up to heights of around
7.5ft when fully extended, Atlas is the brainchild of Boston Dynamics, the
world-renowned robotics company that already has its Spot robotic dogs busy
working on everything from security details to quality control shifts . 

But Atlas, which is fully capable of walking (with some swagger), waving and
performing the odd backflip, is an entirely different proposition and one 
that Hyundai Motor Group, the company that now owns an 80% stake in Boston
Dynamics, hopes could prove a rich future revenue stream for the business.

Due to begin mass production at the firms new Robot Metaplant Application
Center (RMAC), Atlas will begin deployment across Hyundais various smart
factories in 2028, with a view to manufacture some 30,000 units by the year
2030. 

Over the past several decades, most manufacturers have automated everything
that they can automate, explains Boston Dynamics CEO Robert Playter. 

The work that is left is difficult to automate in a cost-effective way. And
that's because the tasks have huge variation. Whether its the parts varying
from car-to-car or because the tasks involve assembly and close-knit 
tolerance and things that you can't do with the traditional robots, he adds.

Consistency is key

During various demonstrations on the Hyundai booth at the Las Vegas 
Convention Center, which was easily one of the most popular this year, Atlas
could be seen moving car parts from one storage area to another  its
56-degrees of movement allowing it swivel its entire body to move between
storage bins, rather than having to walk. 

Similarly, its dexterous fingers could grasp an array of objects, even down 
to the small and delicate stuff, and move it accurately. Weather-proofing
ensures it can work outside and when its batteries run dry, it simply walks
over to a charing dock and replaces them itself. 

While the speed at which Atlas could perform these tasks wasnt exactly
mind-blowing, chief strategy officer at Boston Dynamics, Marc Theerman,
explained to me that this wasnt really the point.

Humans might be super efficient at 9am in the morning, but our studies 
suggest that this efficiency drops off throughout the day. With this sort of
automation, you need consistency, and the robot never gets tired, and the
robot runs at a consistent speed with little interventions, he explains. 

In this respect, Atlas has been designed to be put to work on the sort of
shifts and tasks that would have unions calling for strike action. Downtime?
No way. The company ensured that most of Atlas parts are easily
interchangeable if the worst happens. 

If an arm, a leg of even a hand is broken, these parts can be swapped by
anyone with even the slightest bit of training in a matter of minutes,
Theerman says. This was something we learnt from our Spot robot, our 
customers dont want any downtime to fix robots, he adds.

While humanoid robots are currently at the very epicenter of the hype cycle,
there is a valid reason for choosing this form. Theerman says that he 
predicts many Atlas units will be put to work in facilities that were never
designed for robots in the first place. 

The average plant in Europe or the United States is probably 35 years old. 
And so if you want to automate a plant like that, without fixed automation,
you need something that looks like a human, because that's what the plant was
designed for, he says. 

A quick scan of the Boston Dynamics back catalogue reveals plenty of other
robots, such as its Stretch logistics bot that is solely used for warehouse
operations, that can be implemented for very specific tasks. 

But what sets Atlas apart is the fact it can perform numerous jobs and, 
thanks to advances in AI and, in particular, Large Behavioral Models
(something Googles DeepMind is helping with), the humanoid will be able to be
trained in a matter of days to perform complex actions. 

So far, weve focussed on the physical side of AI, so Atlas can dance, run and
jump. But behavioral is the next frontier. We hope that in the future,
customers will be able to swap the humanoids hands for specific tools, so it
can be taught to weld, construct and much more, Theerman adds. 

At this point, it is worth noting that Hyundais humanoid endeavor isnt the
first of its kind, nor is it the only technology in existence. In fact, 
theres a veritable arms race to launch useful robots.

 Teslas Optimus is designed for general purpose tasks, but early
demonstrations have revealed that it still has some way to go before being
genuinely useful. Similarly, companies such as Figure AI, Agility Robotics 
and Apptronik are all making waves in the emerging industry. 

In fact, Chinese heavy equipment manufacturer Zoomlion already has a team of
humanoid robots busy at work in its network of plants, churning out hundreds
of products a day. 

But Boston Dynamics CEO still thinks his company has the edge, not least
because it has the financial and manufacturing backing of the Hyundai Motor
Group. 

We've already got a pathway that we're cutting with our existing products to
commercialize. We've built our organization around supporting products in the
field, integration, service, repair, logistics, so all of the components
around that. Something that thankfully nobody else is doing yet, he says.
    
The question of replacing humans is neatly brushed off by those in the
business of robotics, seeing as the technology has the potential to replace
vast swathes of manual labour. Thankfully, Atlas, much like its Spot
counterpart, is expensive right now and many plants find it cheaper and more
convenient to use a human workforce. 

But Boston Dynamics chief strategy officer feels that, while it could be a
potential issue, he has found companies with a higher robotic adoption are
more productive, therefore are growing faster, are more profitable, and are
hiring more employees. 

Yes, theres going to be shift of workers, but we think that at the moment,
these robots will always require human monitoring. So we call this job 'robot
wrangler' or 'robot operator'. And that job is growing quite fast, and it's
fascinating, says Theerman. 

And what about your robot butler? Well, the Boston Dynamics CEO thinks that 
is some way off. In fact, he feels robots in the home is the wrong strategy,
citing the fact that the consumer market is very cost sensitive. He also
admits that safety is paramount and that the home is a complex environment. 

"We think it's going to be 2028 or 2030 when we have robots deployed in
factories and probably five years after that before theyre really affordable
in the home," Playter states.

Mark your diaries. The year 2035 could be when we finally witness the rise of
the robots, or find out if its just another hype cycle that will gradually
fade into the CES archives. 

======================================================================
Link to news story:
https://www.techradar.com/vehicle-tech/hybrid-electric-vehicles/the-robot-neve
r-gets-tired-hyundai-explains-why-its-boston-dynamics-atlas-robot-is-ready-to-
take-over-factories-but-not-your-home

$$
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