FEATURE: Why automation is the key for efficient gigafactories

As demand for electric vehicles (EVs) continues to accelerate, so will the demand for the batteries needed to power them. Gigafactories have been touted as the answer to the supply-demand challenge and automation could be key to ensure that batteries roll off the production line efficiently.

Back in 2013, Elon Musk touted the potential of the gigafactory, a new Tesla battery production facility that would have recycling capabilities built in, where “old packs would come in one side and get reprocessed as new packs”.

Musk claimed that the “really giant facility” would be equivalent “to all lithium-ion production in the world in one factory”.

Fast forward a decade and Tesla has four gigafactories across the US, one in Berlin and another in Shanghai. A seventh is being built in Monterrey, Mexico...

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