BEIJING, November 11. Recently, the Davos World Economic Forum (WEF) published the latest batch of "Lighthouse" factories in the global manufacturing industry. SANY's drilling machinery factory in Beijing made the list, becoming the first certified Lighthouse factory among heavy equipment manufacturers.

Nicknamed "Lighthouses", these production workshops are well known for being the most advanced factories in the world. Since the first list in 2018, two authorities, the Davos World Economic Forum (WEF) and McKinsey Consulting, have jointly selected 90 factories worldwide for lighting the path to the future, being examples of the highest level of digital manufacturing and Globalization 4.0.

According to the WEF, SANY Beijing stands out with the comprehensive application of up-to-date technologies such as advanced automation, human-machine collaboration, and AI and IoT technologies, boosting productivity by 185% while reducing production lead time by 77% (from 30 to 7 days). 

SANY Robot Technology Co., Ltd.

The digital transformation of SANY prompted the launch of a new subsidiary company, SANY Robot Technology Co., Ltd., which is propelling SANY Group towards accomplishing the mission of becoming the pioneer of intelligent manufacturing.

Back in 2019, when the existing drilling machinery factory was being upgraded to become the first world-class Lighthouse factory in the industry, there were no precedents ― no examples for SANY to refer to nor existing technology or suppliers to rely on. Thus, SANY Robot Technology was born in the context of SANY's digital transformation. By deeply participating in the phases of conceptual design, technological verification and construction, SANY Robot Technology grew alongside the rebirth of the drilling machinery Lighthouse factory.

Many technological breakthroughs have been made by SANY's new Robot Technology division along the way. Examples include a three-dimensional warehouse for steel plate, the loading and unloading of heavier and longer (27 m) materials with 5G AGVs (Automated Guided Vehicles), the automatic assembly and welding of material in narrow spaces, and large-groove coordinated welding by multi-robots with laser sensors.

Intelligent operation is realized throughout the entire manufacturing cycle, encompassing logistics, warehousing, material preparation, welding, processing, assembly and painting.

The latest technical updates is the new Intelligent Storage System based on AR and speech recognition technologies. Now, picking and distribution tasks are assigned to workers through their AR glasses, who can effectively handle tasks by giving hands-free voice commands.