Foxconn building Blackwell racks with Skild robots
Social reports say Foxconn is assembling Nvidia Blackwell racks and using Skild AI robots in the process — a sign OEMs are automating massive rack builds to meet hyperscaler demand reported. The build-out ties Foxconn closely to Nvidia's platform roadmap at scale.
Reuters reported that Skild AI’s foundation model will power robots on Foxconn’s Houston assembly lines that are building NVIDIA Blackwell GPU racks. (money.usnews.com) Skild has heavyweight backers and scale ambitions: the startup raised about $1.4 billion and hit a valuation north of $14 billion in January 2026, with investors including SoftBank and NVIDIA’s venture arm. (news.crunchbase.com) The company is embedding its “Skild Brain” across industrial robot OEMs via announced partnerships with ABB Robotics and Teradyne’s Universal Robots to accelerate rollouts and data collection. (markets.businessinsider.com) NVIDIA’s GB300 NVL72 Blackwell rack — the same family of systems being assembled — packs 72 Blackwell Ultra GPUs plus 36 Grace CPUs in a fully liquid‑cooled, rack‑scale configuration, increasing mechanical and cooling complexity for factory assembly. (nvidia.com) Foxconn and NVIDIA have already tied large factory programs to Blackwell hardware: NVIDIA described a May 18, 2025 plan for an AI factory with 10,000 Blackwell GPUs, while Foxconn’s 2024 Kaohsiung announcement detailed a 64‑rack, 4,608‑GPU GB200 center slated for completion in 2026. (nvidianews.nvidia.com) Foxconn previously signaled plans to introduce humanoid and other advanced robots at its Houston plant with trials (including UBTech units) and targets to begin robot‑assisted production in early 2026, underscoring the company’s multi‑vector automation strategy. (datacenterdynamics.com) Skild’s CEO has framed OEM integrations as a route to “extreme scalability,” arguing that embedding Skild Brain in vendors with hundreds of thousands of deployed robots creates a feedback‑driven data flywheel for continuous improvement. (money.usnews.com)
