Evaluation of current influencing factors and assessment of opportunities and risks of a cloud approach for the use of autonomous mobile robots – A Delphi study

The number of automated guided vehicles (AGV) is constantly increasing on the way to flexible and adaptable material flows. The growing capabilities of these vehicles, which include a higher degree of auton- omy, have led to them being increasingly referred to as autonomous mobile robots (AMR). A side effect of the integration of autonomy functions is a higher demand for computing power. On the IT side, cloud computing is a proven way to handle high computing power. For data transmission and the connection of AMR/AGV to a cloud, the introduction of the 5G mobile communication standard opens new possibilities for joint operation. Therefore, the aim of this work is to measure the importance of the influencing factors playing a role in the use of AMR/AGV and to identify the potential that arises from connecting these robots to a cloud. A Delphi study was designed and conducted to determine the ranking of the factors and to open a solution space for cloud-based AMR/AGV operation.