Figure is retiring its F.02 humanoid fleet as the F.03 fleet scales up. Instead of disassembling the machines, the company trained them to autonomously jump into an electric arc furnace at a foundry in Imatra, Finland. The operation fitted six melt cycles into a 24-hour window.
Key takeaways
- Six melt cycles within a 24-hour window, in an electric arc furnace with three large graphite electrodes
- A foundry in Imatra, Finland, after refusals from plants in the US and Mexico
- Reason for the refusals: lithium-ion cells inside the robots
- The robots entered the furnace autonomously, with no prior teardown
- The resulting metal was turned into a limited run of commemorative artifacts
Why not disassembly
The standard retirement path for hardware is a teardown into parts. Figure AI went another way.
Melting a machine whole protects the design work baked into the hardware. Nothing is left to reverse-engineer.
The batteries turned out to be the obstacle. Most foundries in the United States and Mexico refused to let machines with lithium-ion cells near their equipment. Only the plant in Imatra agreed to run the process.
Six melts in a day
The electric arc furnace?Electric arc furnace: A steelmaking furnace that melts its charge with the heat of an electric arc jumping between graphite electrodes and the metal. Temperatures exceed 1,500 °C. runs on three large graphite electrodes. The company got a strict 24-hour window and fitted six melt cycles into it.
The robots walked in on their own. Jumping into the furnace was the last task they were taught.
The resulting metal was then turned into a limited run of commemorative artifacts.
What F.02 leaves behind
This generation accounts for Figure's first BMW deployment, the birth of the Helix model, the company's first robot doing household chores and its first logistics deployment.
According to the company, F.02 helped assemble 30,000 vehicles at the BMW plant in Spartanburg.
Its successor already works there. Figure 03 arrived in Hall 52 in June 2026 and moved from simple sheet-metal loading to part sequencing, driven by Helix 02.
Why it matters
Fleet retirement is a problem the humanoid industry is not yet discussing out loud. The machines have short life cycles, carry lithium-ion cells and protected design work, and the recycling infrastructure is not ready for them.
Refusals from foundries in two countries show a real barrier. Once fleets run into the thousands, disposal stops being a curiosity and becomes a cost and regulatory line item.
What's next
- A small number of F.02 units still sit in storage at Figure headquarters, with no stated fate
- Helix 2.5, an extension of the model born on F.02, reaches 56% zero-shot success across 30 unseen homes against 9% for a model trained from scratch, per Figure
- Figure 03 works in Hall 52 at the BMW plant in Spartanburg on part sequencing
Sources
- Figure — F.02 Decommission
- Figure — F.03 Arrives at BMW
- Figure — Helix 2.5: Zero-Shot 30-Home Generalization
