Humanoid Robots on the Factory Floor: Convinced, but Waiting for Proof

This spring, BMW put a pair of AI-powered humanoid robots on a European factory floor alongside its workers, a first for the automaker in the region. These humanoids, known as "general-purpose" machines, can move through spaces built for people and, thanks to AI, handle a range of tasks. Whether these robots take over industrial spaces is still an open question. To get the perspective from the people running plants and warehouses, Altman Solon spoke with a select group of senior facilities and supply chain leaders at multinational corporations.

This study follows our Humanoid Home Robotics Survey from November 2025, moving from the home to the factory. The contrast is sharp. In the home, we found enthusiasm running ahead of adoption, with cost, familiarity, and comfort holding buyers back. On the industrial floor, the leaders we spoke with are already automating. They approve and run robotics programs, allocate large automation budgets across plants and distribution centers, and expect general-purpose and autonomous robots to keep taking on floor work. What they are waiting for is proof.

Mix of productive floor hours: today versus in five years

Already automating, already spending

When it comes to adoption, industrial buyers are well ahead of the consumer market, where interest still outpaces action. Every leader we spoke with is engaged in general-purpose robotics today. Most are running pilots or operating live deployments, and the rest are budgeting for a pilot or evaluating vendors. None described robotics as off the agenda.

Their view of the floor five years out is just as direct. Today, these leaders estimate that manual human work fills roughly 61% of productive floor hours. Within five years, they expect that share to fall to about 35%. Over the same period, they think general-purpose robots under human oversight and highly autonomous robots will climb from a combined 18% of hours to 44%, more than double. Traditional fixed automation holds roughly flat. It is stable and trusted, and operators plan to keep leaning on it as newer systems grow around it.

Current stance toward general-purpose robots at factory sites

Four requirements before a pilot begins

Despite the leader's belief in the future of general-purpose robots, this doesn't translate into a purchase order. Across our conversations, four requirements decide whether a pilot happens at all.  

Where the work is

When asked which jobs they would seriously consider handing to a general-purpose robot in the next two years, leaders converged on the heavy, repetitive core of the plant and warehouse. Case and item picking topped the list, with palletizing and internal material movement close behind. Trailer loading and unloading, sortation, and assembly assistance drew interest further down. The pattern is clear. Buyers want to move heavy, repetitive, high-volume material that is hard to staff and hard on people. One leader responsible for 17 warehouses said plainly that what they needed was faster truck unloading and fewer people on forklifts.

The form factor barely matters

For all the attention humanoids attract, the word itself carried little weight in our conversations. Leaders framed the decision around outcomes, precision, and payback rather than shape. A distribution leader who had already installed robotic arms put it simply: capability and return drive the decision, and a human form is not a requirement. For these buyers, a humanoid body is worth paying for only when it is the most efficient way to get a task done. Heavy humanoid positioning reads as marketing rather than value.

The consumer market is waiting for affordability and awareness. The industrial market is waiting for proof. For the operators we spoke with, the open question is which vendors can demonstrate, integrate, and de-risk fast enough to capture a shift they already expect.

To go deeper on the requirements leaders set before approving a pilot, the commercial models they prefer, and what the findings mean for the investors and vendors backing this market, download the full whitepaper.

How Altman Solon can help

Altman Solon combines proprietary research with deep TMT strategy and due diligence experience to help investors and robotics vendors make confident decisions in a market that is moving quickly but remains unproven. We can support you with: 

• Go-to-market and commercial model strategy for robotics and Robotics-as-a-Service providers, including pricing, use-case prioritization, and target-account selection.

• Commercial due diligence, including demand assessment, market sizing, and adoption timing.

• Technical due diligence and vendor evaluation against the operator requirements that decide real deployments.

• Ecosystem mapping and market-entry strategy across the industrial robotics value chain.

• Investment thesis development and target screening in an emerging vertical.