Figure AI founder claims robots running on BMW production line 10 hours a day

Last week, Brett Adcock, founder of Figure AI, posted to social media that one of his company’s humanoid robots had been running on the BMW X3 body shop production line for five months. 

“We have been running 10 hours per day, every single day of production,” Adcock posted on X. “It is believed that Figure and BMW are the first in the world to do this with humanoid robots.” 

A video in the post shows what appears to be a robot assembling a rear body panel. 

This week, Figure has passed 5 months running on the BMW X3 body shop production line

We have been running 10 hours per day, every single day of production!

It is believed that Figure and BMW are the first in the world to do this with humanoid robots pic.twitter.com/zAXCbApXBJ

— Brett Adcock (@adcock_brett) October 6, 2025

BMW also shared a similar video in March with the caption stating the return of the humanoid robots marks their next phase in automotive production. BMW said the return brings “us closer to integrating these innovative technologies into our future production processes.” 

However, there have been some questions about how large a role the robots have been playing in the BMW production process, according to an article published by Fortune, not long after the video was released. 

BMW and Figure announced the deployment of autonomous humanoids at its South Carolina plant in January 2024. While the BMW release didn’t say the number of robots, BMW told Robot Report that it was starting with one robot for technical evaluation in the first stage. 

In August 2024, BMW announced that the robot had conducted a trial over several weeks at the Spartanburg plant, where it inserted sheet metal parts into specific fixtures to be assembled as part of a chassis. 

During the trial run, BMW said it learned what requirements must be met to integrate so-called multi-purpose robots into an existing production system. Doing so includes learning how humanoid robots communicate with the system under real conditions

At the time, the company said it was collaborating with Figure for future applications in vehicle production and continued to develop the robots based on the trial run findings. 

The company also said that as of August 2024, there were no Figure robots at the plant. 

Fast forward to February of this year, and Adcock posted on LinkedIn that BMW currently had a fleet of robots performing end-to-end operations. 

Yet, in April, Fortune reported that BMW was only using one Figure robot at the plant during off-hours and that it was practicing picking up and placing parts in the plant’s body shop. It also reports that a BMW spokesperson told the company that just before the article’s publication, a robot was moved into live production hours, but involved performing the same limited chore. 

“BMW declined to comment on the disparities between what Adcock had publicized in February and what the auto giant said was the reality at the time, referring those questions to Adcock,” Fortune reported. “The serial entrepreneur and representatives for the company have not responded to requests for clarification or comment.” 

A spokesman also told Fortune that a humanoid would eventually do a single task in the plant’s body shop, where metal sheet panels are eventually assembled to form a vehicle chassis. 

Just before the article was published, Figure released the video that of a robot assembling what looks like a rear body panel. The video is the same video BMW shared in March. 

Once the Fortune article was published, Adcock posted on X that his litigation counsel took action to defend the reputation and the future of Figure and would not stand for mischaracterizations and “downright lies written in the recent Fortune article.” 

At 9am ET this morning, my litigation counsel took action to protect and defend the reputation and the future of Figure for all its stakeholders, and especially its employees and investors who believe in the future of AI and robotics

At first, we were going to ignore the noise,…

— Brett Adcock (@adcock_brett) April 25, 2025

TechCrunch reported in June that Adcock made a public appearance at the Bloomberg Tech conference, where he didn’t provide specifics about the contractual relationship with BMW when asked. 

“We get a lot of value, and it’s really important that we need to figure out how to run robots every day,” Tech Crunch reports Adcock saying. “We get to see how well they perform. We get to track all the metrics.” 

Adcock also said during the event that Figure AI expects to manufacture and deploy roughly 100,000 units within four years.

AI education at SEMA

Repairers can also learn more about AI during a Repairer Driven Education (RDE) session, hosted by the Society of Collision Repair Specialists (SCRS) during this year’s SEMA Show in November.

On Nov. 4 from 2:30-4 p.m., BodyShop Booster’s Ryan Taylor will provide a firsthand demonstration of AI during “AI Robots are coming: Humanoid meet and greet.”

The session description states that during the interactive and hands-on class, attendees will see how AI can be leveraged in a body shop setting to streamline operations, enhance precision, and potentially change the guest experience with humanoid robots from international markets.

“AI is advancing at an unprecedented pace, transforming industries, interactions, and revolutionizing the way we work,” the description states. “This year marks a significant milestone, as agent-based AI technologies have reached a level of sophistication where tasks that once required immense human labor and resources can now be completed in a fraction of the time — often in mere minutes — and with greater efficiency.”

To register visit here.

IMAGE

All images of Figure 02 provided by BMW Group

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