Economic Feasibility of 5G-Based Autonomous Mobile Robots Solutions for Industry 4.0

The adoption of Fifth Generation (5G) technology in industrial enterprises has been slower than expected despite its clear technical advantages, primarily due to the significant initial investment costs and uncertainties surrounding the return on investment (ROI). High costs associated with infrastructure deployment, combined with the complexity of assessing the economic benefits specific to different industries, have made the decision to switch to 5G a complex and cautious one for many companies. This situation is worsened due to the lack of comprehensive techno-economic analyses that could provide clearer insights on the potential ROI of 5G implementation across different industrial scenarios. In this article, we propose a 5G-based centralized control solution for automated mobile robots (AMRs). We provide a techno-economic analysis assessing the total cost of ownership (TCO) of acquiring this solution compared to its no acquisition in an Industry 4.0 environment. A sensitivity analysis is also included for the AMR-based solution identifying the variables with great impact on the TCO. Results show that despite the initial higher upfront costs of an AMR-based approach with respect to human-based approach, it incurs lower operational costs over time, requiring only 2.5 years to become more cost-effective than the human-based one.