Soon: It’s no secret that robots are heavily involved in manufacturing, often at the expense of human labor, and a Sony factory building the PlayStation 4 is no different. Its assembly line pumps a fully functional console in just 30 seconds, and only four people are involved in the process.
As reported by Nikkei Asian Review, the factory, operated by Sony’s manufacturing arm, Sony Global Manufacturing & Operations, is located on the outskirts of Kisarazu, across from Tokyo Bay.
The 103-foot assembly line at the PlayStation 4 facility was completed in 2018. The assembly is done entirely by robots, with the only humans directly involved being the two who power the motherboards on the line, and two who package the consoles finished.
The Kisarazu plant has 32 robots, supplied by Mitsubishi Electric, 26 of which are exclusively dedicated to attaching cables, tapes, and other flexible parts to the consoles, a complex task that most robots would find too delicate. The PS4’s flexible ribbon cable, for example, requires a robotic arm to hold the cable and another to twist it. Then the cable must connect in the right direction with just the right amount of pressure.
“There is probably no other site that can manipulate robots this way,” said one of the site engineers. “The combination of robotic and human labor is meticulously optimized with a return on investment priority.”
It is unclear whether the more complex PlayStation 5 will also be expanded via an assembly line in just 30 seconds, although a mostly automated process seems likely. We recently saw a photo of what is supposed to be a PS5 that has just come out of a line, but the image could easily be false.
