ROI (Return On Investment) and Robotics

The purpose of this paper is to present ideas and general guidelines for the manufacturing engineer confronted with figuring the ROI on a piece of automated equipment. Since every company figures the ROI differently, and every piece of equipment within the same company has different justification guidelines, the discussion is limited to broad terms. However, it is felt that every engineer working on an ROI could get some new ideas to help with the justification equation.