China’s ROKAE Robotics says it has delivered 10,000 force-controlled arms designed for humanoid robots, a manufacturing milestone that points to growing demand for the hardware needed to put humanoids to work in industrial settings. The 10,000th unit left the company’s Shandong production line in September, with the milestone announced on October 26. The figure covers arms, not complete humanoid robots, and excludes ROKAE’s conventional industrial and collaborative robot lines.
Force control matters when robots handle parts that cannot be gripped or assembled with fixed movements alone. ROKAE’s AR Series regulates force at individual joints, helping machines respond to contact during manipulation. Its MAC controller can coordinate seven joints in one arm, 14 across a pair, or more than 20 joints in a humanoid configuration. These capabilities are especially relevant to assembly, where small variations in part position or resistance can disrupt a task.
ROKAE says more than 80 industrial partners have integrated the arms into production applications. One example is Schaeffler’s factory in Taicang, China, where five of ROKAE’s Helios wheeled humanoids equipped with AR Series arms are operating on a line for humanoid robot components. Their reported work includes parts handling, assembly and inspection. Schaeffler previously disclosed six humanoids working across five stations at the facility, but the companies have not clarified how the two robot counts relate.
