As a business owner, you should always be looking for ways to improve your ROI. Robotics automation could be a great thing to invest in. However, not all automation technology is worth the investment.

You should familiarize yourself with different robotics automation technology on the market and make sure to allocate your capital expenditures wisely. This requires assessing your business needs and calculating the expected ROI from your robotics technology.

The state of robotics automation under capitalism in the 21st-century

Automation is a complicated concept that has received a lot of attention inside and outside the business community. Many clueless political pundits state that automation is a form of worker exploitation. They argue that businesses use it to displace workers to retain higher profits.

This is a rather cynical and unnecessarily harsh perspective of automation. If you get past the partisan, boilerplate talking points, you’ll see that there are a number of great benefits of automation.

Automation could be a great investment. There are a number of robotics applications that can pay handsome dividends to pragmatic business owners in the 21st-century. It should come as no surprise that sales of industrial robots have risen 30% since 2016.

The question is whether or not robotics automation is ideal for your business. Here are some reasons that robotics automation and RPA software is almost always going to be a great investment for your small business.

You intend to operate your business for at least a few years

Some business owner is shy away from investing in expensive robotics applications, because the price tag seems off-putting. They should instead look at the long-term return, just like they would with any other capital expenditure.

Many robotics applications can be purchased for well under $30,000. However, let’s look at a hypothetical $30,000 robotic solution. If this technology reduces labor costs by $8000 a year, then it will pay for itself in less than four years.

It is pretty much a no brainer that you should invest in it if you plan to keep your company in operations for at least a few years.

Depreciation costs should almost always exceed savings from labor costs

Even if you are considering selling the company within that timeframe, it might still be worth the investment if the robot is not expected to depreciate quickly. Since industrial robots last a long time with proper maintenance and the benefits that they offer rarely go obsolete within a couple of decades, they don’t tend to depreciate very fast. As long as the depreciation costs exceed the savings from labor, you will find that it is a worthwhile investment.

If you purchase a $30,000 robot that is expected to last a decade, then its depreciation cost will be about $3,000 a year. If you plan to sell your business in three years, you will save $24,000 in labor costs. The robot will have only depreciated $9,000 in that timeframe. This means that the net return on your investment by the time you sell the company will be $15,000.

The robotics automation tools can use machine learning to match the performance of human employees

Human employees are capable of performing rather complicated tasks. However, a well-programmed robot can do the job even better. They can operate more quickly, don’t notice a productivity decline from fatigue and make for fewer errors.

The only obstacle to overcome is making sure that the robot is capable of performing the task in the first place. Robots have been able to outperform human employees performing menial tasks for decades. However, they have only recently started to perform more complicated tasks that required highly skilled employees.

Machine learning is making robots far more reliable. Roberts using sophisticated machine learning software can be taught to handle all kinds of complicated tasks, which can help you replace traditional employees.

Robotics automation is a great solution for thriving businesses

A growing number of small businesses are looking to robotics technology to boost their ROI. Robotics is a great way to lower costs and get consistently high productivity from your workplace.