CES 2026: Hyundai Motor Group leverages Group capabilities to lead the AI Robotics industry
5 minute read
At CES 2026, Hyundai Motor Group announced our commitment to building a Group Value Network for human-centered AI Robotics, bringing together the Group’s collective capabilities. Under our theme ‘Partnering Human Progress’, we outline our tangible plans to accelerate commercialization of human-centered AI Robotics—amplifying human potential and empowering people in both work and everyday life.
Teaming up for human progress
Hyundai Motor Group’s plan is clear: the Group will accelerate its business by leveraging its global mass-production capabilities and a robust value chain across its affiliates. Through collaboration between Boston Dynamics—home to the world’s most advanced robotics technology—and global AI leaders, Hyundai Motor Group will integrate cutting-edge AI Robotics across all HMG manufacturing sites worldwide, and subsequently expand into logistics, energy, construction, and facility management sectors.
Through this, we reveal how human-centered AI Robotics can go beyond the laboratory to become an integral part of human life—and why only Hyundai Motor Group can make this vision a reality.
Partnering our Group Value Network with Boston Dynamics
Many companies develop robots, but bringing them into real-life applications involves countless trials and errors. The key differentiator of Hyundai Motor Group’s AI Robotics lies in its ability to apply and validate these technologies at scale, backed by the world’s largest manufacturing capabilities.
Hyundai Motor Group’s integrated AI Robotics value chain
Hyundai Motor Group’s manufacturing facilities are helping to develop reliable robots that are tested and trained internally. Thanks to various capabilities within the Group, we can supply parts, mass-produce robots, and provide one-stop robotics-as-a-Service (RaaS). Working with affiliates like Boston Dynamics, the Group is expanding its mass-production expertise from automotive to robotics, increasing overall value for customers.
Each of HMG’s group affiliates plays a crucial role in development and testing by bringing its own expertise:
- Hyundai Motor Company and Kia provide manufacturing infrastructure, process control and large-scale production data.
- Hyundai Mobis works closely with Boston Dynamics to develop high-performance actuators, standardizing key components and optimizing designs for manufacturability.
- Hyundai Glovis optimizes logistics and supply chain management.
By integrating all these areas of expertise, we can offer ongoing customer support after deployment, including regular software updates, hardware maintenance, repairs, and remote monitoring and control. These services enable us to oversee the process from start to finish, helping to bring AI Robotics solutions to market.
Hyundai Motor Group’s robotics solutions are already operational across several industries, with partners including DHL, Nestlé, and Maersk. As we strive toward our ambitious goal of achieving 9.8 million annual vehicle sales by 2030, Atlas will move beyond its pilot stage and enter full-scale production, seamlessly integrating into HMG’s global manufacturing value chain. We will then expand its applications to logistics, energy, construction, and facility management. Our AI Robotics services are tested at HMG’s development sites, ensuring companies receive comprehensive, customized solutions backed by reliable data and support, regardless of their specific needs.
Partnering humans with co-working robots
Boston Dynamics has long demonstrated the tangible success and real-world value of advanced robotics in the industry, notably with Spot and Stretch. Building on this foundation, we are taking the next major leap with Atlas product.
When imagining a robot, the Atlas product model checks every box. Created by Boston Dynamics as a product-ready robot designed for industrial work, it is conceived to operate alongside humans, especially in dangerous or challenging environments. Updated with technology designed to assist people, Boston Dynamics’ AI Robotics support people by easing their workload for a number of tasks.
Carrying heavy objects that were once the duties of humans is just one example of its promise and potential. Aside from relieving humans of physically demanding or repetitive tasks, it can learn and adapt in its role as a workplace partner, becoming a trusted and dependable robotics colleague. This is our approach to human-centered AI Robotics: robots working for and with people as support.
This vision is becoming a reality through the development of the Atlas product, with plans to integrate them into the manufacturing system of HMG, which has an annual automotive sales target of 9.8 million units by 2030.
Training robots at the Robot Metaplant Application Center (RMAC)
Creating and offering optimal human-centered AI Robotics solutions requires the right facilities for constant training, testing, and improvement. Hyundai Motor Group’s Software-Defined Factory (SDF) and Robot Metaplant Application Center (RMAC) are responsible for training and validating its AI Robotics solutions to ensure they meet the highest performance and quality standards.
While most factories today have evolved to remain hardware-focused, we are leading the transition towards SDF. The advantages of SDF are significant: they operate based on a software and data-driven manufacturing model, enable greater agility and flexibility, while creating safer work environments by integrating AI software at the heart of manufacturing. Compared to hardware, software is simpler to update, offers more features, and promotes knowledge sharing across HMG’s global network. Through the SDF model, we aim to better serve our customers, respond quickly to market changes, improve product quality, and reduce costs through greater efficiency. Additionally, SDF fosters better collaboration between humans and robots, supporting reliable deployment and ongoing improvement across all plants.
Before deployment in SDF, robots first undergo learning and training at the Robot Metaplant Application Center (RMAC), facilities that serve as hubs for robot training and validation. Providing robots with a technical training environment allows them to learn and adapt through every lift, turn, and recovery in authentic factory conditions. This process enables robots to become faster, smarter, and safer. Data collected from real-world operations in SDF flows back to RMAC where they are used for retraining, creating a continuous cycle of improvement.
The RMAC is set to open in 2026. Atlas robots trained at RMAC will start sequencing tasks at HMGMA by 2028, with more complex operations like assembly beginning by 2030. Their deployment and integration into the manufacturing landscape not only improve product quality but also emphasize the collaborative relationship among SDF, RMAC, and robots like Atlas.
Partnering with leaders in AI
Hyundai Motor Group envisions a future of manufacturing driven by human-centered AI Robotics. For us to deliver on our promise, we recognize that our robots require more than just physical intelligence. They must be equipped with advanced foundational skills to reason and respond to real-world environments to optimally support people across various work situations.
To achieve this, Boston Dynamics is partnering with Google DeepMind. This collaboration is founded on a powerful idea that a general purpose brain is most powerful when combined with a highly capable generalist body. By combining Boston Dynamics’ humanoid robots with Google DeepMind’s leading Gemini robotics AI foundation models, we aim to create new opportunities for AI Robotics beyond manufacturing to a much larger set of complex, real-work tasks.
This will pave the way for the successful large-scale deployment of robots as trusted and helpful partners to people.
Engineering a better world through safe and validated human-centered AI Robotics
At Hyundai Motor Group, AI Robotics is not about concept robots confined to laboratories — it’s about robots that step into our lives and provide real, practical help. Transformative change doesn’t happen with words like “we can do it”; it happens when we take real action.
That’s why Hyundai Motor Group doesn’t keep robots in the lab. Instead, we deploy them first in the most demanding and precise environments—our manufacturing sites. Here, robots collaborate with people, and only AI Robotics that have been tested and proven in these conditions can become trusted partners in our everyday lives.
Join us on Hyundai Motor Group’s journey to create safe and validated, human-centered AI Robotics together with the best partners.
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