Swarm robotics could spell the end of the assembly line

I went into the article expecting to find useful insights on swarm robotics.

I found nothing but a bunch of buzzwords and a sense that the author doesn't know a thing about swarms OR robotics.

This is something I highly doubt would be more efficient. This article highlights a big issue in the patent industry, someone patented having a swarm of robots autonomously building an aircraft, but if they didn't actually DO it, and just make a high level sketch, they shouldn't receive a patent.

I suspect the future looks more like Kill Decision by Daniel Suarez.

Swarm robots engaged in destruction as opposed to construction. Destruction is a lot easier.

And my beehives could be trained to make butter sculpture replicas of Michelangelo's David.

But I don't see either realistically happening. This is a puff piece that's far, far too credulous.

Gartner would surely put "swarm robotics" very early on the hype curve if they beleived it existed at all.

That seems like an extremely broad patent

TLDR: Instead of an assembly line where items are constructed piece by piece, robotics could work together ["swarm robots"] simultaneously to build the product in one go, faster and and better. AI will make this much more practical.

There may be truth to the above, but it's not binary. No doubt AI is already being used to speed up some production line, somewhere - and as AI improves, each machine may be able to do more. But having 100 hands working together doesn't necessarily mean you have a better final product.

Not gonna happen, even in a 100 years.

Someone’s been playing factorio.