American automobile company Ford has rehired hundreds of its laid-off experienced engineers, as the firm’s transition to artificial intelligence (AI) systems has failed to perform vehicle quality checks, alongside the workers’ experience and skills. 

The company had made a major shift to cut costs and boost output by adopting AI and automated systems across several parts of its operations, but later discovered that the new technologies could not deliver the expected results and failed several safety and quality checks.

According to Bloomberg, it has rehired more than 300 “veteran” engineers to help improve quality control and identify issues through inspection before automobile parts reach production lines.

Ford’s Vice President of Vehicle Hardware Engineering, Charles Poon, said the company underestimated the importance of experienced engineers who had worked through several product cycles.

“Artificial intelligence is a fantastic tool, but it’s only as good as the information you use to train it,” Mr Poon said.

“Over prior years, we didn’t pay as much attention as we should have to the experience of our most knowledgeable engineers who have been with us through many product cycles,” he added. 

Mr Poon said Ford initially believed that introducing AI and providing it with design requirements would be enough to produce high-quality vehicles.

The rehired engineers are now helping to improve the company’s operation systems while also mentoring younger workers and supporting vehicle quality reviews.

“Mistakenly, we thought that by just introducing artificial intelligence and ingesting the design requirements that we had, that would produce a high-quality product,” he said. 

Ford executives said the move does not mean the firm will abandon AI but shows that human experience and skill remain crucial to detecting defects and improving manufacturing processes.

The development comes as firms globally continue to adopt growing AI tools in different fields, with businesses looking for ways to combine automation with human skills.