Get 8 papers that detail perspectives from related standards efforts, industry needs, and cutting-edge research on automatic guided vehicles (AGVs). The authors discuss performance standards and benchmarks that can enable technology transfer from the laboratory to industry. These papers tackle the complexities of multiple AGVs operating in unstructured environments.

This book comprises expanded versions of selected papers presented at the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) workshop. This research sets the stage by reviewing standards development for other mobile robot application domains, such as emergency response, and suggests approaches for tackling performance measurement for intelligent AGVs. The authors discuss examples of performance standards that could be used for vehicle navigation performance and for perception systems.

Automatic guided vehicles were one of the earliest applications for mobile robots. The first AGVs were deployed in the 1950s to transport materials in large facilities and warehouses. Mobile robot capabilities have advanced significantly in the past decades. General-purpose sensing, planning, communications, and control are paving the way for an era where the “A” stands for “autonomous.” This evolution in onboard intelligence has greatly expanded the potential scope of applications for AGVs; thus, ASTM has formed a new committee to develop these missing standards for measuring, describing, and characterizing performance for this new breed of AGVs. ASTM’s Committee F45 on Driverless Automatic Guided Industrial Vehicles will standardize nomenclature and definitions of terms, and develop recommended practices, guides, test methods, specifications, and performance standards for AGVs.