Although technically the opportunity has been available for many years, the level of automation in the furniture-making industry is a relatively low, if you consider robotic and autonomous types of automation as used by Moduform, for example.
Of course, basic automation technology of the type represented by electric saws, routers, drills and so on are widespread – not many people use hand drills nowadays. But if we put those kind of power tools aside in the “electrification” category, with no autonomous functionalities, then we can say there’s not really much automation in furniture-making.
It’s not going to be like that forever, in large part because of the emergence of collaborative robots, which, as readers of this website will know, are robots which are smaller, lighter and specifically designed and certified to be used directly by a human worker. [Read more…] about New tools of the trade: Can robots revive craftsmanship in furniture making?