Smartwatch Assembly: ABB Robots on Wrist-Sized Lines

Smartwatch assembly packs a screen, battery, circuit board, sensors and seals into a case small enough to wear all day. Parts are tiny and tightly packed, and every finished watch has to be tested before it ships. This post follows the wearable from the first digital watch to today's health trackers, looks at the Apple Watch Ultra 4 launch in September 2026, and asks where ABB robots such as the YuMi, the IRB 930 SCARA and the SWIFTI could work. I found no confirmed ABB smartwatch line, so that part is a possibility.

A vintage Pulsar LED digital watch from the 1970s. Photo: Joe Haupt / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

From the Pulsar to the first smartwatches

In 1972 the Hamilton Watch Company introduced the Pulsar, described as the first digital watch. In 1984 Seiko's Data-2000 and RC-1000 Wrist Terminal brought computer-like functions to the wrist, and in 1994 the Timex Datalink became the first watch to receive data wirelessly from a computer. Seiko launched the Ruputer in Japan in 1998, which is sometimes called the first smartwatch. Casio also made keypad watches with data banks, and a Data Bank watch is pictured here.

A Casio Data Bank watch with a calculator-style keypad. Photo: cisnky / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

Smartwatches stayed a niche until the 2010s. The Pebble, funded on Kickstarter in 2012, raised 10.3 million US dollars. In 2013 Samsung's Galaxy Gear, the Sony SmartWatch 2 and the Qualcomm Toq all launched. In 2014 Google introduced Android Wear and Apple announced the Apple Watch, and in 2018 Samsung introduced the Galaxy Watch series. The Pebble's Kickstarter total showed that people would pay for a watch that talked to a phone, and the larger companies followed within a year.

A Pebble smartwatch in its box, 2014. Photo: Romazur / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The Apple Watch began shipping worldwide in April 2015. Later models added more to the case: built-in LTE cellular connectivity arrived with the Series 3 in 2017, and the Series 4 added an ECG feature in 2018. The back of a modern watch carries a window of optical sensors, and every window needs a seal that keeps out sweat and water. Each feature adds parts that have to be placed, sealed and tested, so a smartwatch line has a long list of steps.

An Apple Watch on show at launch in April 2015. Photo: ubahnverleih / Wikimedia Commons (CC0)

The September 2026 launch and the factory behind it

Apple announced the Apple Watch Ultra 4 on 9 September 2026, with in-store availability from 18 September and a starting price of 799 US dollars. Its case is 3D-printed titanium made from 100 percent recycled titanium, and the whole device is made with 45 percent recycled material. Apple's 2025 description of the same process said six lasers fuse more than 900 layers of recycled titanium powder over about 20 hours to build one case, using 50 percent less raw material than before, and Apple expected to save over 400 metric tons of titanium in 2025. The Ultra 4 also measures heart rate every five seconds.

The backs of three Apple Watch models, showing their sensor windows. Photo: Mliu92 / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

A case like that arrives at the assembly line as a finished part. After that, a watch must be filled with a display, battery, board and sensors, closed up and tested for function. Dymax announced in late September 2026 that it had expanded its light-curable product portfolio for consumer wearable assembly, and in mid October Assembly Magazine asked why physical AI needs more than machine vision. For the testing side of the job, see smartphone testing, where robots test phones.

An Apple Watch Series 4 Nike model lying on a table. Photo: Dnkography / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

ABB has no smartwatch line project that I could confirm, but its robots match the work. The IRB 930 SCARA, launched in 2023 for electronics and battery assembly, is a fast arm for placing and pressing parts. The dual-arm YuMi assembles small parts beside people, and the SWIFTI CRB 1100 is a fast cobot that an engineer can program with a tablet. A cell could pair them with a camera to find each part, and RobotStudio could check the cycle time first. Watchmaking shows what YuMi already does with stopper parts at Hawa Sliding Solutions in Switzerland.

An engineer with an ABB IRB 930 SCARA robot, launched in 2023 for electronics and battery assembly. Photo: ABB

What comes next for wearable lines

Wearable lines change every year: Apple's titanium cases appeared on the Series 11 in 2025 and again on the Series 12 and Ultra 4 in 2026. A new case, a new sensor window and a new battery shape mean a new fixture, and a line built for one model has to be retooled for the next. Flexible cells with quick program changes suit that pattern. Programs can be built and tested offline in RobotStudio before the hardware arrives, which saves time when a product has a short life. Small parts, tight tolerances and delicate screens remain the hard part of the job, and any robot must place them without scratching the glass.

ABB YuMi assembling small parts beside a lab worker. Photo: ABB

The open problems are cost, skills and safety. A SCARA cell costs money that a short product run must repay, and a technician who can program vision systems and fixtures is hard to find. Cobots such as the YuMi use force limits for work beside people, and ABB's SafeMove software adds speed and zone monitoring where a worker shares the cell. Clean handling matters too, because a fingerprint on a display or a speck of dust under glass shows up in the finished watch.

An engineer programs an ABB SWIFTI CRB 1100 cobot with a tablet at a small workshop bench. Photo: ABB

For homes, the effect is indirect. Wearables are gaining health sensing, and each new sensor adds work to the line that makes the watch: another window to seal, another test to run. Apple's Ultra 4 reports heart rate every five seconds, which depends on sensors that sit flush against the skin. If a future home robot needs small, sealed electronics inside it, the techniques proven on wrist-sized lines will probably be used to build them. The open problems are the usual ones, cost, skilled people and safe handling of tiny parts.

A Pebble Time 2 on a wrist, photographed in May 2026. Photo: Waldyrious / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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