Google and Foxconn want to work on robots together

Google and Foxconn are in talks to collaborate on robots. Foxconn may want to use the robot technology in production in its gigantic factories. Google has acquired several robot companies.

Foxconn, the name under which the Chinese company Hon Hai operates, is already working to use more and more robots for the production of electronics, but the collaboration with Google should accelerate this, writes The Wall Street Journal. The group would negotiate about this with, among others, the former Android boss Andy Rubin. He is in charge of the robot project at Google. Foxconn chairman Terry Gou is said to be enthusiastic about Rubin’s demonstrations.

Google has acquired seven robotics companies in the past six months. These include the Japanese Schaft, a start-up that was engaged in the construction of humanoids, the robot arm manufacturer Bot & Dolly and the company Holomni, a company that develops powered castor wheels. The largest acquisition was that of Boston Dynamics. This company emerged from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1992 and developed numerous notable robots, such as the running Cheetah.

With its project, Google would focus on the use of robots in factories and distribution centers. Foxconn’s factories employ more than a million Chinese. The company has been in the news regularly in recent years because of poor working conditions and low wages. Improving this resulted in rising costs.