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JTC and Kajima Run Four Autonomous Machines From a Control Room 20m From Bulim Yard
Two Gravis-retrofit excavators and two Kajima A4CSEL compactors work under supervision at Jurong Innovation District since January. JTC announced the pilot 17 September 2026; Phase 1 ends early 2027. Operator and speed figures are targets.
As of 17 September 2026, JTC Corporation and Kajima Corporation have four autonomous machines working under supervision at the Bulim Autonomous Yard in Jurong Innovation District, Singapore: two excavators fitted with a Gravis Robotics retrofit kit and two compactors running Kajima's A4CSEL system. JTC announced the pilot that day. The Straits Times, which photographed an excavator on the yard on 16 September, reported that Phase 1 started in January with those four machines and is set to end in early 2027. Operators supervise from an operating room 20m from the sandbox. JTC calls it Singapore's first autonomous heavy construction equipment pilot, and the paper calls it the first project at JTC's new 1ha sandbox. Nothing from Bulim has been measured in public yet.
What is confirmed is the setup: the machines, the partners, the control-room arrangement, and the phase dates. What is unreported is any output. Neither JTC nor the Straits Times publishes cubic metres moved, area compacted, hours run, or a count of interventions from Bulim. The two headline figures, a halving of operator manpower and a 20 to 30 per cent gain in construction speed, are JTC's targets for the trial, and this article labels them as aims. Figures below come from the JTC release of 17 September and the Straits Times report by Maryam Munshi, published 17 September and updated 18 September. Three X posts between 18 and 21 September restate those sources and add no new figure.
Photo by Troy Mortier on Unsplash. Stock fallback after site generate_article_image VARIANT_FAILED.
Who is on the yard and what they brought
JTC is the host and owns the sandbox. The Straits Times says the 1ha yard was announced by National Development Minister Chee Hong Tat at ConTech@PDD in July, and that the pilot runs with the Public Sector Science & Technology Policy & Plans Office and the Housing Board. Kajima supplies A4CSEL for the compactors; JTC says this is the system's first deployment outside Japan. The excavators carry a Gravis Robotics retrofit kit. JTC notes in a footnote that Gravis closed a $200 million Series A from SoftBank in August 2026. Kajima is working with Kok Tong Construction and Tractors Singapore Limited on the retrofits, on training Singapore-based operators and engineers, and on documenting lessons for the industry.
The retrofit route is a design decision both sources explain the same way: contractors can upgrade machines they already own rather than replace fleets, which JTC says lowers the barrier to adoption. Since 2025 the agency has required robotics in its construction tenders, and it says it has at least 800 hectares of earthworks projects in its pipeline over the next five years. Calvin Chung, JTC's assistant chief executive officer for the Engineering & Operations Group, put the agency's position in the release.
17 September 2026. Official announcement. Supports the partners, the Gravis retrofit and A4CSEL first-outside-Japan claims, the geofence and remote-monitoring workflow, the 50 per cent / one-operator-two-machines target, the 800ha pipeline, the 2025 tender mandate, the MOM safeguards, the 2027 bulldozer and dump truck extension, and the verbatim Chung and Riho quotes. Footnotes carry the Gravis $200 million Series A and the Naruse Dam Japan figures.
17 September 2026, updated 18 September 2026. Supports Phase 1 start in January and end in early 2027, the four-machine count, the 1ha sandbox and its July announcement, the operating room 20m from the sandbox with line of sight, KTC operators trained in Japan, the Tosh Chin Kah Woo paraphrase, the 20 to 30 per cent speed aim from Cheong Jiawen (paraphrased), the Luke Wu Naruse Dam paraphrase, the BCA $53 billion projection, the 15 per cent shortfall and 90 per cent foreign-worker figures, an...
JTC and Kajima Run Four Autonomous Machines From a Control Room 20m From Bulim Yard | ConstructionMagazine.ai
Adding more manpower is not a sustainable way to meet Singapore's future construction needs. JTC has a pipeline of at least 800 hectares of earthworks projects over the next five years. If the pilot succeeds, we will deploy autonomous heavy construction equipment across suitable projects in our pipeline and support wider industry adoption. - Calvin Chung, Assistant Chief Executive Officer, Engineering & Operations Group, JTC, JTC press release, 17 September 2026
How the supervised pilot runs
Both sources describe the same loop. An operator in the operating room assigns a task to each machine and sets the virtual geographic boundary, the geofence, that the machine must stay inside. The machine then carries out the task using its sensors and artificial intelligence, with nobody in the cabin and nobody standing beside it. Staff in the room monitor the work and step in when something goes wrong. The Straits Times adds that the room sits 20m from the sandbox and that monitoring staff have a direct line of sight to the machines. This is remote supervision at close range on a fenced test yard.
The people at the console came from the contractor, not the vendors. Two operators from Kok Tong Construction travelled to Japan to be trained by Kajima's operators, the Straits Times reports. One of them, project engineer Tosh Chin Kah Woo, oversees activities from the control room after a week of training in Japan. In the paper's paraphrase, he said he used to cordon off the excavator's work area physically, and that the commands and boundaries are now built into the system.
One supervised run at Bulim Autonomous Yard as JTC (17 Sep 2026) and The Straits Times (17 to 18 Sep 2026) describe it
1Operator in the operating room 20m from the sandbox assigns a task to each machine
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2Operator sets the virtual boundary (geofence) the machine must stay inside
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3Machine carries out the task on its own sensors and AI, with nobody in the cabin or nearby
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4Staff with line of sight to the machines monitor the run from the control room
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5Staff intervene when an issue occurs; emergency-stop controls sit on site and in the control room
The safeguards are being written alongside the trial rather than before it. JTC says it is working with the Ministry of Manpower on operating guidelines and safeguards for industry-wide deployment, drawing on what happens at Bulim. The release lists three: geofencing to keep machines inside designated areas, LiDAR sensors to detect people and obstacles, and emergency-stop controls both on site and in the control room. Neither source gives a publication date for the guidelines.
The targets, and what they are not
The subhead on JTC's release says the project targets a 50 per cent reduction in skilled operators required. The body of the release and the Straits Times both put it as one operator overseeing two machines from a control room away from the construction zone. The second figure appears only in the Straits Times. Cheong Jiawen, JTC's director of future of building and infrastructure, told the paper that for this trial JTC is aiming for a 20 to 30 per cent increase in construction speed compared with traditional machines. The paper paraphrases him. No measured speed, no baseline machine, and no method for the comparison appear in either source. Both figures are aims for a trial whose first phase has months still to run.
Operators needed to run two machines, conventional one-per-cab vs JTC's target for the Bulim pilot; JTC release 17 Sep 2026; a target, not a measured result
The context the two sources give for those aims is a labour problem. The Straits Times cites the Building and Construction Authority's projection that Singapore's total construction demand will reach $53 billion in Singapore dollars in 2026, and industry reports, which the paper does not identify, showing a persistent manpower shortfall of nearly 15 per cent. It also reports that foreign workers make up nearly 90 per cent of the manual semi-skilled workforce in the sector. JTC told the paper that many migrant workers have already been trained on site robots, and that suitability for the autonomous machines will depend on skill and aptitude. None of those figures measures anything at Bulim.
What the Japan record does and does not show
The one operating record in either source comes from Japan, and it belongs to A4CSEL rather than to the Gravis excavator kit. In a footnote, JTC says that during construction of Naruse Dam in Akita Prefecture, A4CSEL enabled three operators based 400km away to manage 14 automated dump trucks, bulldozers, and vibratory rollers, with the machines running continuously for up to 70 hours at one point. Luke Wu, managing director of The GEAR by Kajima, gave the Straits Times the same example, in the paper's paraphrase. Those are Kajima's Japan figures, not a Bulim measurement. Bulim in Phase 1 has two compactors and two excavators supervised from 20m away.
We believe the combination of Kajima's technologies and Singapore's innovation-driven environment will help realise the next generation of construction. - Yoshihiko Riho, senior executive officer, Kajima Corporation, The Straits Times, 17 September 2026
What happens after early 2027
The sources lay out a sequence with a condition at each step. Phase 1 ends in early 2027. A second pilot follows, adding autonomous bulldozers and dump trucks to form a coordinated fleet; JTC says the two companies "will also explore" that extension in 2027. Once the trials are complete, the Straits Times says, the machines "may be pushed out" to JTC's sites within Jurong Innovation District by 2028. Chung's condition is "if the pilot succeeds". Neither source defines success or who decides. JTC also says it will run more trials at the Bulim sandbox with other partners it does not identify.
The X posts that followed the announcement add confirmation rather than facts. A post from 22Astronauts_ on 20 September restated the Straits Times report. A post from leo_stalemate on 18 September linked the JTC release and repeated the one-to-two operator target. A 21 September post from SiteSpecs noted for readers outside Singapore that this is industrial earthwork on a 2027-to-2028 timeline and says nothing about residential crews.
What to ask before you put a retrofit autonomous excavator on your own earthworks
Bulim gives a contractor a clean list of what a pilot of this kind should be able to state, because JTC and Kajima have stated the setup and not yet the results. Put them to any vendor offering a retrofit kit.
What the machines have moved or compacted since January, over how many hours, and how often the control room has had to intervene.
What the baseline is for the 20 to 30 per cent speed aim: which conventional machine, which task, and who measures it.
Whether one operator can hold two machines at once on a dig-and-load cycle rather than a compaction pass, and who is accountable when a geofence is breached.
How supervision changes when the control room is no longer 20m away with line of sight, which is what a live JTC site in 2028 would mean.
What the Ministry of Manpower guidelines will require of a contractor, and when they will be published.
What a Gravis or A4CSEL retrofit does to the machine's warranty, telematics contract, and resale value, and who holds the operating data the pilot generates.
Which of the at least 800 hectares of JTC earthworks would be first to carry the equipment, and under what tender terms.
The first dated production figure from Bulim, whenever JTC or Kajima publishes it, will be the number to hold against those aims.
· X (leo_stalemate)
18 September 2026. Secondary confirmation. Links the JTC release and repeats the operator target; adds no new figure.
21 September 2026. Secondary commentary. Repeats the Phase 1 and 2028 dates from the Straits Times and argues the pilot has no bearing on U.S. residential labour; its HBI housing figures are not used in this article.