Vision for automated car plant
Unikie and Ford have worked together on automated vehicle marshalling at Ford’s Saarlouis production plant. This technology revolutionises the logistics of car manufacturing, making moving the cars from the production plants to dealers smoother.
“In manufacturing plants that do not use our system, people have to manually move the cars to the testing lines or parking and maintenance spots. By the time the car has been transported from the plant to the dealer, people have been moving it from one place to another dozens of times,” Vesa Kiviranta (Chief Business Officer of Technology Business, Unikie) describes the currently common situation.
Unikie’s Marshalling solution, piloted at Ford’s production plant, allows for multiple cars to be remotely and simultaneously controlled during logistics processes. Thanks to this technology, cars can be maneuvered to the right places efficiently and safely.
Achim Schmidt-Soltau, Chief Engineer of Final Assembly Engineering at Ford, gives an example of a truck driver arriving to pick up the cars bound for the dealers. “In the past, the driver would have to circle the field to pick up all the cars. Using Unikie’s Marshalling system, these 6–8 cars can be remotely steered onto a truck.”
We interviewed Achim Schmidt-Soltau about what Ford has achieved through the cooperation with Unikie. The interview was filmed in October 2023 at Ford Electric Vehicle Center in Cologne, Germany.
