Every story
AI automation news from factory floors in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, newest first. Every story names its source.
107 days to go: what the Machinery Regulation means for self-learning safety functions
From 20 January 2027, any safety function that learns on its own needs a notified body. Self-certification is off the table for it.
BMW starts its first humanoid robot pilot in Europe, at Plant Leipzig
Hexagon Robotics' AEON, built in Zurich, works on battery module assembly and component production. It follows a 10-month US pilot.
Siemens picks its own Erlangen plant as the blueprint for AI-driven factories
Announced with NVIDIA at CES 2026: the aim is a fully AI-driven, adaptive manufacturing site, starting in Erlangen this year.
Bitkom: 57% of German firms now use AI. None say they use it fully
The share has nearly tripled in two years. But 59% say they are not using AI's potential at all, and one in three sees its own existence at risk.
voestalpine wants AI to run 2,000 saws and mills on less energy
The SAELING project in Kapfenberg targets 20 to 30% energy savings. At Donawitz, machine learning predicts cracks in billets before they appear.
How Audi checks 1.5 million spot welds a shift with AI
Ultrasound spot checks gave way to AI that reviews every weld, so people look only at anomalies. A second system finds weld spatter with eight cameras.