Automated Guided Vehicles for Material Handling Applications

ORBIS Corporation is a plastics manufacturer located in Monticello, Iowa. They have constructed a new 100,000 sq. ft warehouse and distribution center connected to the main plant. ORBIS wants to conduct an Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV) study to understand the benefit versus the cost of implementing this technology instead of using their current personnel on forklifts. The AGVs would travel from the stretch wrapper to the double-depth warehouse racking. Another task is to retrieve materials from storage and place it in the proper truck staging area. This newer technology is being looked at by many companies as an option to reallocate manual labor to more complex tasks instead of material transport. When a completed return on investment report is completed, this can be applied to other businesses and their desires to implement this technology. Our proposed solution aims to provide ORBIS with a clear list of the costs versus benefits of implementing this AGV technology with an estimated Return on Investment (ROI) for multiple vendors. This return on investment shows ORBIS how the initial investment of the Automated Forklifts is absorbed by cost savings over a time period