Ford hires 350 engineers after AI quality control fell short

• Ford hires 350 employees to address problems with automated systems design for quality control
• The company’s decision is linked to a problem with AI that led to inaccurate results during the inspections of vehicle interiors
• After the AI fell short, the company behind the rehire of 350 engineers was forced to restore mainstream quality, according to JD Power, in just 16 years

Ford in the US has rehired 350 human inspectors after an AI system that companies call “gray/grey beard” (a term used in the US) failed to meet expectations, according to Fortune, Bloomberg and The Next Web. The reason is that the system’s AI camera detected defects incorrectly.

As Bloomberg reports, the automated inspection system made mistakes, missing defects that human workers would have caught. The material also notes that Ford has been using AI for quality checks for years, but the results were not up to the standard of JD Power’s mainstream quality.

Ford’s decision, according to the article, follows concerns that AI can be unreliable in real-world conditions. The company had to reintroduce human inspectors to ensure the quality of the vehicles.

Forbes also notes that the problem may be due to the fact that AI systems can learn patterns from limited data and then fail when they encounter new conditions. That is why the company decided to bring back human workers to verify results.

Meanwhile, Ford’s process is not unique: other companies have also faced issues with AI automation. For example, Klarna, which in 2022–2024 used an AI assistant for customer support, also had to adjust its approach after errors were reported, Bloomberg writes.

Tags: USA/Technology/AI/Automotive