Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by beambot on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @03:51PM
(#9971155)
Your accounting ignores the uncertainty inherent in immigrant labor -- i.e. all the indirect costs associated with severe labor shortages when the political winds shift. The story in Georgia a few years back is telling [1]. For example, if immigration is curtailed, labor shortages will cause issues. If immigration is permitted, then healthcare costs could skyrocket. Robots are (at least) predictable -- and that can be a huge win in a lot of cases.
[1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/05/17/the-law-of-u...
Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by GFK_of_xmaspast on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @07:54PM
(#9972467)
Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by JoeAltmaier on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @03:30PM
(#9971030)
More variables: picking only ripe fruit; handling the fruit more carefully; picking more rapidly so you can share the robot with many growers; refrigerating the fruit from the moment of picking. Any of these could make it worthwhile?
Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by mikepurvis on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @04:44PM
(#9971435)
This is more an argument for an augmented human system than it is a slam dunk for something completely autonomous.
For example an unmanned, refrigerated, follow-me cart with a soft hopper could be a multiplier on picking productivity without all the hassles of actual mobile manipulation and perception.
Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by smt88 on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @04:34PM
(#9971375)
Humans have evolved to be good at identifying and handling ripe fruit. I think a machine could be better, but it'd take a ton of R&D.
If a machine picks fruit 2x faster (which is unlikely, check out a YouTube video of people picking), then you still only need 2 people to beat it in efficiency.
Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by mrfusion on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @03:33PM
(#9971044)
Good points. I guess your argument might vary by crop though. So I'm curious if there are crops that are closer to that economic threshold. Mangos?
Re:How Driscoll’s Is Hacking the Strawberry of the Future
by smt88 on Wednesday July 29, 2015 @04:32PM
(#9971362)
I've heard of crops where a machine shakes the tree, and the crop falls to the ground (maybe some kind of nut?). Then another machine vacuums them up and separates them from other debris.
Let's say you spend $10M on R&D (a very low number in my opinion), each robot costs $50k to build, and maintenance/repairs cost $5k/year. You decide to charge your first customer $100k because you have to cover some of your R&D, and you pass all the maintenance costs on to them.
For that $105k per year, a farmer could hire ~8 people for an entire year. But most growers only need labor for a few months at the most. So, assuming a crop that requires people for about 3 months, you're actually looking at 32 humans vs. a single robot.
If the economics made sense, people would use harvesting robots. But at this point, picking fruit is something humans are particularly good at and computers are particularly bad at, and humans are still very inexpensive.