Start now: Fanuc future-proofs the smart factory workforce

Automation is reshaping the factory floor, with robotics applications dramatically improving the safety and efficiency of industrial operations. But smart factories require different skillsets, and today’s engineers are as likely to need knowledge of programming and coding as they are welding. On top of that, the current workforce is aging. For automotive manufacturers, there’s an urgent need to attract a new wave of workers with the skills to operate, programme, and maintain robots and other automation technologies.

That’s the message from factory automation and robotics specialist Fanuc. The company’s UK division is embarking on a range of awareness, educational, and training programmes designed to attract and prepare a workforce fit for the factory of the future. “We want to ensure that going forward—both in the short and long term—we have the correct workforce with the right skills to ensure that automation is adopted in the best way,” says Oliver Selby, Head of Sales for Fanuc UK. “The skills that we’re seeing among people entering the UK workforce at the moment are not necessarily the ones that our industry is asking for.”