Automate 2025: Inbolt, FANUC integrate to tackle assembly line automation

As part of Automate 2025 in Detroit, Inbolt and FANUC announced an integration that looks to tackle assembly line automation, allowing the CRX cobot and other FANUC robot models to operate with real-time Inbolt’s 3D vision and adaptive trajectory correction, even with part variation or imperfect environments.

Inbolt and FANUC are hosting live demos of the integration at Booth 8632 during Automate 2025, held May 12-15 in Detroit’s Huntington Place.

Partnership launched at Automate

Inbolt said its integration with FANUC robots is the first offering on the market using FANUC’s robots and Inbolt’s intelligence layer and real-time vision. The companies announced General Motors is the first to adopt this new integration. Other brands, including Stellantis, Ford, Whirlpool, ThyssenKrupp Automotive and Toyota, use Inbolt’s technology across various applications.

“This new collaboration between Inbolt and FANUC gives car manufacturers a new level of automation: precision tasks, performed by robots, on lines that never stop,” said Rudy Cohen, CEO of Inbolt. “No more expensive indexing. No more undue complexity and maintenance challenges. Just robots operating in a continuous motion environment and a huge leap forward for automakers' General Assembly Shop.”

The companies said the system operates up to 100 times faster than conventional offerings, and is designed to scale across diverse production needs, whether for manufacturers worried about maintenance or line throughput or system integrators requirements for easy and quick installation.

The new platform combines FANUC’s streaming motion capabilities, which enable real-time trajectory input via Ethernet, with Inbolt’s lightweight, robot-mounted vision system and AI model. Key features include:

• Real-time 3D guidance: Inbolt’s proprietary localization AI refreshes at a high rate continuously identifying object orientation and adapting robot paths on the fly, enabling high-speed screwdriving and part insertion without indexing.
• Flexible deployment: Operates in low-space environments, with no need for fencing, which the companies said is ideal for General Assembly stations.

Offering built for realities of the assembly line

This integration supports bolt rundown, screw insertion, filter installation and other tasks which are challenging applications for traditional robotics. The system handles real-world constraints: crowded stations, variable parts, minimal floor space, and most importantly moving lines and variable part positions.

“Our primary goal is to reduce the complexity of automation,” said Albane Dersy, COO of Inbolt. “With Inbolt’s guidance system and FANUC’s native motion control, robots can now think and act on the fly.”

The organizations added that the system lowers the barriers to high-performance automation by complex, real-world environments.

A single robot can now handle over 100-part models with real-time accuracy, even on continuously moving lines. Deployment is streamlined through the Inbolt Studio platform, which allows users to import CAD files, train the AI model, validate tracking in real time and launch the program directly on the line.

“As industries navigate rising demands for efficiency and cost-effectiveness, automation has become an essential solution—and the timing has never been better,” said Lou Finazzo, vice president, sales, at FANUC America. “At our new Innovation Lab, FANUC is collaborating with forward-thinking startups like Inbolt to harness cutting-edge solutions, from cobots to AI and streaming motion applications, tackling challenges in the automotive sector and beyond."