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Advantages and disadvantages of renting a robot

If AI progress in advance more, many people will read this article more too.

Because if the business of rental robot becomes famous, I’m sure many companies will be interested in the new business.

In this article we will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of renting robots.

What is the cost of robot rental?

The robot rental cost will be calculated by asking the leasing party for a quote and haggling to a mutually agreeable price. As a result, there are not many clear-cut rental costs listed on internet sites.

However, if you do a search online, the cost of renting a ‘Pepper’ robot, developed by Softbank, will be clearly stated.

The rental cost of the main body of pepper is 990,000 yen (monthly 27,500 yen x 36 months). In addition, there is the cost of ‘Pepper for Biz Basic Plan’ at 27,500 yen monthly for 36 months, or 990,000 yen, so far totalling out to 1,980,000 yen.

Plus there is a ‘Robot procedure fee’ of 9800 yen and a ‘Pepper for Biz Anshin（Peace of mind） guarantee pack’ which costs 9800 yen.

If you think about that companies can rent a “pepper” with 2 million yen which is cheaper than hire a person so, it is more useful and efficient for a company. Maybe this will take over people’s jobs.

And also, not only the company that sends people for other company to work with, currently, there are companies that send robot for other companies to use. Therefore, using robots in the company is very important for the companies to work efficiently

What are the benefits of robot rental?

Here, we will introduce three advantages of renting a robot.

1: You can try a new robot

By introducing a new robot for rental, work efficiency is improved, so although it has taken many hours to manufacture, it is possible to shorten the time and lower labor costs, which makes the company happy.

In addition, employees can be motivated because they can rent new robots.

2: Pay only monthly rental fee

Even with the introduction of robots, payment is only the monthly cost or running cost.

As I mentioned earlier in the case of pepper, it costs just over 2 million yen over 3 years, and if you experience unexpected mechanical issues or malfunctions, you can also receive appropriate maintenance without additional cost, the liability falls upon the leasing party.

3: You can cancel

In the case of rental, if you borrow something but it does not improve working efficiency, or it does not meet expectations, you can cancel the contract after discussing cancellation terms with the leasing party.

Therefore, even if under contract, renting can be said to be an advantage as there is lower risk of the robot not living up to expectations than if you bought the robot. If you actually buy or lease robots, you cannot cancel in the middle of payment process. But if you realise that robots will not help them too much, it is an idea that you can just cancel the contract.

What are the disadvantages of renting a robot?

Next, I will explain two disadvantages of renting a robot.

1: The rental may be more expensive

The higher cost compared to leasing means that robots will pay more than leasing if they match the site and run longer than planned. Of course, rental is cheaper if it is short term.

2: Humans must respond while the robot is in trouble

Even if a robot is rented, people will have to deal with potential technical or mechanical failures, perhaps by picking up the robots workload, until a maintenance team comes to the site.

As a result, there is a risk that the entire company’s work will stop, so sometimes it will be necessary to prepare for unexpected situations.