A team led by Lee Ju-kyung (이주경) at the Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute (KERI) AI Research Center has developed autonomous manufacturing multi-agent AI technology with Changwon National University, KERI said on Tuesday.

According to the research team, autonomous manufacturing multi-agent AI supports intelligent division of labor through multiple agents. Like a foreman issuing instructions, a language agent gives commands and the vision and robot-control agents communicate with each other to share roles.

The team said it focused on improving the limitations of grounding technology, which enables real-world perception, in the process.

Previously, when someone said, "that red part over there," robots often wandered to the wrong place because they did not know where "over there" was or what exactly the "red part" referred to. KERI said that with autonomous manufacturing multi-agent AI, the language agent identifies the work intent, the vision agent analyzes objects' 3D coordinates using a camera to generate a control scenario, and the robot agent executes the scenario with precision and without error, forming an integrated collaboration system.

Lee said regional small and midsize companies are hesitant to adopt AI because of high costs and labor shortages. "Our technology is a solution that can smartly transform existing manufacturing lines without major costs, and we will contribute to strengthening regional manufacturing competitiveness through technology transfer," he said.

KERI and Changwon National University aim to train students who participated in the convergence research into "advanced AI talent" who can be deployed immediately in local industry, with the goal of building a virtuous-cycle ecosystem to address national challenges such as population decline and weakening manufacturing competitiveness.