Last month, Hexagon Robotics and Schaeffler, a motion technology company, announced that AEON, Hexagon's humanoid robot, has entered Schaeffler's Humanoid Gym in Germany. The milestone is the next step in the strategic collaboration towards a planned deployment of at least 1,000 AEON humanoids in the coming years.
The Humanoid Gym provides a train–validate–deploy model in a dedicated industrial environment. Schaeffler and Hexagon teach AEON new industrial capabilities while building the expertise within Schaeffler required to operate, train and integrate humanoids into production. This will prepare both the robots and the manufacturing ecosystem for deployment while expanding the breadth of use cases on the factory floor.
AEON will learn new industrial tasks through imitation learning and repeated execution, refining and validating robot policies using representative manufacturing applications from Schaeffler’s factories. This minimizes operational disruption while ensuring new capabilities will perform reliably once deployed in production.
The initiative builds on the strategic partnership announced by Schaeffler and Hexagon Robotics in April 2026 to accelerate the adoption of industrial humanoid robots. In addition, Schaeffler will supply advanced actuator technology to AEON.
"With AEON being trained in our Humanoid Gym, we are taking the next step in turning humanoid robotics into an industrial reality,' said Dr. Jochen Schröder, COO at Schaeffler. "Through our collaboration with Hexagon Robotics, we can test and refine these systems under real-world conditions, supporting our broader ambition to strengthen manufacturing performance and enable scalable automation."
Training at the Humanoid Gym will accelerate AEON deployment across multiple use cases in manufacturing workflows within Schaeffler over the next six months, supporting humanoid deployment across Schaeffler’s global operations.
