This is Kisarazu, Chiba Prefecture. We are inside the Kisarazu site, a Sony base that is home to the key PlayStation production strategy team.

In this area of 31.4 meters by 6 meters, it takes just 30 seconds for a team of 32 robots to build a PS4.

The motherboard is moved to the starting point of the production line. The area beyond is off-limits even to Sony employees.

Flexible white arms suddenly appear from both sides of the line. They connect wires and tighten screws. They work without pause. The robots look like they are dancing elegantly. At the beginning, more than 80 robots worked in the area, far from practical.

Sony has reexamined every single process of the operation. Now, one robot repeats the motion of moving sideways from right to left and plays two roles by working with another in each position. Memos are attached to surfaces all over the place such as the operation line below and on the partitions that surround the robots. A great deal of trial and error can be found in those memos. Finally, the entire operation process was automated in 2018.

“If you keep watching them long enough, they will start to look like humans,” said one engineer. The look in his eye is gentle like a father watching over his children. Unlike large robots that lift heavy items, the delicate movements of compact robots resemble those of human arms and have surprising warmth. “Probably there is no other production site that uses this robot this efficiently,” he said. The soft-spoken engineer’s words show his confidence in the robots.

The production line works, thanks to the genius of the engineers. Its capabilities are best demonstrated in processing soft items such as cables and tape-like parts. Robots are not good at handling paper and strings. It is difficult for them to predict the slack and distortion of parts that flap or fold easily and they are also breakable.

Sony has made the PS4 as compact as possible. Soft foldable parts are attached inside the game console in tiny space.

Sony decided that it could achieve the highest return on investment by employing a hybrid solution that kept human staff to operate the motherboard at the beginning of the process and in packing at the end. It started using this hybrid approach in 2019.

Labor costs still determine competitiveness because the assembly of electronics including TV set and smartphones is difficult to fully automate.

Japanese companies have moved production bases to other countries to secure cheap labor. In the 2000s, Electronics Manufacturing Service, or EMS, providers emerged in China and Malaysia to support production systems and many manufacturers developed close relationships with them. The PlayStation was no exception to this trend.

Automation changes how companies compete. Rather than going where labor costs are low, companies instead have to consider proximity to where the product is consumed, the stability of power supply, access to capital. Irregularities in operations caused by the difference in skill levels and a shortage of labor are no longer problems. The supply chain has been reorganized and making parts in-house is now central to the operation. Product design is also changing to accommodate automation.

The front line of manufacturing has become the trigger for innovation.

The PlayStation foretells the future of manufacturing.

Putting on the main unit cover is the last step in the production of the PS4. The crane grabs the PS4 that has passed the inspection process one at a time and places it on the lane. Neatly lined up PS4s are heading to be packed.

Now it is heading to gamers around the world.

A father and son spending time together, a student glued to the state-of-the-art game and a man in a suit are all stopping by. The store’s PlayStation section attracts a wide range of people. The distribution network was cut off due to the coronavirus pandemic but has slowly started moving again and now the store is open. Things are gradually returning to normal.