Cyngn deploys self-driving tugger to Polaris

MADISON — Look, ma! No hands! Or, in this case, “Look, boss! No hands.”

Thanks to Cyngn, employees at the Polaris manufacturing plant in Madison will be able to move products around with a self-guided vehicle.

California-based Cyngn announced this week it has delivered a “DriveMod Tugger” to Polaris. The vehicle enables chains of multiple carts containing vehicle frames and components to be towed autonomously. Polaris boasted some $8.9 billion in sales in 2023

“Deploying with Polaris reflects our continued traction in the automotive and vehicle manufacturing sectors,” said Lior Tal, Cyngn’s chairman and CEO. “Polaris is a well-known brand for various offroad vehicles that we would often think of as DriveMod integration targets for Cyngn, so we are excited at the product validation that comes from a leading OEM applying Cyngn technology to its own vehicle manufacturing processes.”

Polaris’ production capacity leans heavily on industrial vehicles such as tuggers, moving material across its 20 manufacturing facilities. The addition to the Polaris fleet presents a significant opportunity to automate additional tasks for efficient manufacturing and establish a resiliency to the challenging labor market, Cyngn said in a news release.