Towards 5G-Aware Robot Planning for Industrial Applications

Abstract

With the emergence of Industry 4.0, comes an increasing need for multi-robot coordination and communication to efficiently complete joint tasks. A critical technology is the fifth generation (5G) mobile network, which enables multiple robots to execute control tasks with differentiated quality-of-service (QoS) features. However, there has been limited analysis of the impact of real 5G capabilities on multi-agent robot planning problems. In this paper, we provide a review of robot planning algorithms suitable for industrial use-cases, which consider communication aspects in the planning formulation. The paper is further positioned to identify gaps in existing state of the art within communication-aware planning. This is followed by an analysis of key challenges to be targeted at the intersection of 5G, Industry 4.0 and multi-agent robot planning. This analysis is strategically important and would prove useful to academic researchers and industry experts focusing on deployment of robots in industrial settings.