unmanned factory
Oppo started with an MP3 player for the Chinese market and a DVD player for the American market. It currently ranks fourth in smartphone shipments in the global market, behind only Samsung, Apple and Xiaomi (data from the analytical company Canalys is based on the results of the third quarter of 2023).
Over two decades, Orro has built eight production centers in China, India, Indonesia and Turkey. One of them is in the central Chinese city of Chongqing, whose population is twice that of Moscow.
Oppo’s production center in Chongqing has an area of 1 square meter. km. According to brand representatives, this is the largest smart production center opened in 2019. The factory includes a smart manufacturing facility using SMT (Surface Mount Technology) technology, where assembly takes place in a quality testing laboratory performed by robots.
Externally, the factory looks like a hotel or business center: there is a lot of greenery on the territory of the factory, there is a small waterfall and a fountain with a pond.
To enter its territory, we had to cover the cameras of our smartphones with special stickers. We examined every “eye” of the Oppo Find N3 foldable smartphone received for testing, including its five cameras.
I had the chance to see the assembly shop through the glass windows. And the first thing that caught my eye was that there was almost no one there. According to Oppo product specialist Coco Jan, who accompanied us, most of the tasks here are performed by robotic machines.
“90-95% of the SMT process is automated to minimize human errors,” says Jan.
Robots are responsible for almost everything, from printing circuit boards to assembling them, gluing them to finishing with testers. Therefore, it may seem that the future has already come and people are no longer needed, but non-essential tasks and the preparation of machines for work are still performed by people.
In another part of the factory, it was shown how finished devices are tested before they start being transported to distribution points.
He was almost the single most memorable; A robed employee of Orro reminded me of a doctor sitting in a white room and just playing mobile games. Tested the behavior of smartphones under long-term load. Ideal job: playing games and making money.
Oppo conducts more than 150 tests on its smartphones in Chongqing, most of which are automated. One of the most effective is the drop test. Here it happens in several stages: Smartphones are dropped onto a hard surface from a height of 1, 1.5 and 1.8 meters.
Among the tests, we remember the Plug and Remove test, in which the charger is inserted and removed from the smartphone, the button press test, and the bend test, in which a situation is simulated when a person puts the device in his back pocket. He takes off his jeans and sits on a chair. Robotic arms also test the folding and opening of covers.
“A total of 800 thousand key tests are carried out for the side power button, volume button and fingerprint scanner. If the user presses the keys every 1 second, it will take 10 days to complete all the tests manually,” said Coco Jan.
Specific batches of smartphones of all models produced are tested in a similar way.
Once you understand how much effort, time and nerves it can take for a person to perform such tests, questions about why robots are involved suddenly disappear.
Photo laboratory in IKEA style
There is another Orro laboratory in another region of China – in the city of Dongguan. Here, robots test smartphone cameras in various scenarios. To do this, on the territory of the Oppo Imaging Laboratory, which has an area of 600 square meters. I built 16 spaces that vaguely resemble the showrooms at IKEA. This is a true “indoor city”.
For example, here the interiors are built in the style of a karaoke club, children’s room, supermarket, bookstore and even KFC fast food. Moreover, if the furniture in these places is real, the food is also fake. So the coffee was plastic, including the mug and the liquid itself, and all kinds of fruits and croissants were rubber, but the women’s cosmetics in one of the venues were real.
All items in these areas are glued in place so that nothing can move. This is done to ensure that the conditions are the same in every photo.
Why were all these places needed? Robots resembling vacuum cleaners move around with smartphones attached to them. There are special stickers throughout the complex indicating where the robots will stand and take photos.
“In the process of developing a new smartphone, at least 150 cycles of photo testing are carried out, with 500 photos in each round. This means approximately 75 thousand photos for each smartphone model,” shared Coco Jan.
The tests in this laboratory are fully automated, thanks to robots that go to locations and independently regulate the lighting level in each room. This helps identify the camera’s strengths and weaknesses in different shooting conditions.
“Previously, to perform the same tests, an engineer had to spend a whole day testing two or three smartphones. Now a round of photo testing takes just two hours; which is five times faster than before,” Jan noted.
At the end of each round of photo testing, Oppo engineers check the dynamic range, color rendition, brightness, image sharpness, digital noise level and quality of portrait shots; They even use special mannequins placed in different positions for this. After completing the entire procedure, Oppo engineers examine the images and bring the photo processing algorithms to the “ideal” level.
After the camera algorithms pass all tests and receive approval from engineers, Oppo organizes special trips to take test shots in real conditions. At this stage, the same system is being tested by people in different cities of the world and in different weather conditions.
Office and private smartphones
A socialbites.ca correspondent also visited Oppo headquarters in Shenzhen, China. They showed off the company’s iconic devices, including its first foldable smartphones that never went on sale. Perhaps even the most respected people inside are unaware of their existence.
These are several folding prototypes of different types, the first of which dates back to April 2018. For comparison, the Samsung Galaxy Fold was only released in September 2019. We were not able to test these devices: they are behind glass, like exhibits in a museum.
Devices specific to the Chinese market, including the first Oppo phones produced before the advent of the Android operating system, as well as branded TVs and smartwatches, were also exhibited here.
The most notable device in this part of the tour was the Oppo Find X, a very unusual smartphone with a panel extending from the body, on which two main and one front cameras are built. The device, which does not have any cutouts for the cameras, looks really beautiful and elegant. It is a pity that no manufacturer has begun to develop this aspect.