Researched
Industrial Robot (Unimate)
The first industrial robot lifts hot die-cast parts at General Motors: robots replace people in dangerous repetitive work.
Open in the interactive tree →George Devol filed the patent in 1954, and Joseph Engelberger turned it into Unimate, which went into service at a General Motors plant in New Jersey in 1961. Robots of this kind replay movements exactly without understanding their surroundings. According to the IFR, about 5 million industrial robots were operating worldwide in 2025 (a record), and factories installed more than 600,000 new ones that year.
Prerequisites
- Electrification1882
- Programmable Computer1941
- Cybernetics & Feedback Control1948Robot arms depend on feedback control of their joints
Unlocks
- Warehouse Robots2003-2012
- Robots & Lights-Out Factories2015–2026
- Humanoid Robots2026