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ロボットか人か？

CNC / injection machine tending

Operator loading and unloading a machine vs Cobot machine tending cell

Whirrworkによるモデル推計であり、事実ではありません。 方法論 · 予測の検証記録

人 · 年額$119,635Operator tending
ロボット · 年額$45,523Buy a cobot cell
回収期間11 か月
逆転する年すでにBase-case year (earliest to latest across scenarios)

On these numbers the robot option is clearly cheaper.

アメリカ合衆国 · USD · BLS OEWS May 2025 national medians by SOC occupation

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作業量
仮定

Hours per day the machine needs tending.

仮定

Shift hours per day.

仮定

Working days per month.

仮定

Months per year.

人員
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

BLS OEWS May 2025 national median hourly wage, SOC 53-7063.

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

Wages and salaries were 70.0% of total employer compensation cost for private industry workers in June 2026 (ECEC), so total cost = wage / 0.70.

ilostat.ilo.org

Nominal 4.4% a year, 2015-2025 (ILOSTAT hourly earnings).

仮定

One operator-hour.

ロボット
仮定

The machine cycle sets the pace, so one robot-hour covers one operator-hour.

算出値 Automation Distribution

Midpoint of UR5e arm listings $39,083-$43,544 (arm only).

Plastics Machinery & Manufacturing

Reported RaaS rate for a six-axis machine-tending robot, per robot-hour (provider handles integration).

仮定 THG Automation (integrator)

Gripper, fixtures, safety, guarding, programming. Integrators say the arm is often half or less of the total.

THG Automation (integrator)

Integrator rule of thumb: 3-5% of system price per year.

仮定

Useful life in years.

仮定

Availability.

仮定

Hours lost to faults and jams.

仮定

Changeovers, first-article checks and odd parts that need a person.

仮定

Operator minutes per robot-hour (loading trays, inspections, restarts).

仮定

kWh per robot-hour.

仮定

Electricity price per kWh (USD). Check your bill; energy is rarely a big line.

資金
仮定

Annual financing / discount rate. Nobody publishes yours; 8% is a round mid-2026 commercial borrowing guess.

仮定

Years in the NPV comparison.

仮定

Share of a human service price that is labour (rises with wages). Used to escalate and to adjust US service prices to other countries.

仮定

Share of a robot service price that is labour (pilot, technician). The rest is equipment, which learning curves make cheaper.

仮定

Share of a lease or RaaS fee that pays for hardware (learns down). The rest is service and support (moves with wages).

Download these results (CSV)

結果

選択肢月額年額Per unit (tending hour)初期費用回収期間Break-even utilisation5-year NPV vs baseline
人 Operator tending 比較の基準 $9,970$119,635$28.32— — — —
ロボット Buy a cobot cell $3,794$45,523$10.78$81,314 11 か月 17%
Utilisation 98%
 $322,817
ロボット Robot by the hour (RaaS) $6,225$74,698$17.68$40,000 9.2 か月 13%
Utilisation 98%
 $204,283

What moves the answer most

Each bar shows the 5-year NPV of the best robot option when one input moves to the low or high end of its range, with the rest held at your values.

5-year NPV vs baseline: Buy a cobot cell5-year NPV vs baseline: Buy a cobot cellWorkloadlow value: 8 → $122,555high value: 24 → $485,372Hourly wagelow value: 15.856000000000002 → $242,571high value: 23.784 → $403,062Supervisionlow value: 3 → $362,780high value: 20 → $226,906Integration and setuplow value: 15000 → $347,817high value: 120000 → $242,817Employer on-cost multiplierlow value: 1.2790000000000001 → $280,701high value: 1.579 → $364,933Work that stays humanlow value: 0.05 → $307,361high value: 0.3 → $233,812Financing and discount ratelow value: 0.05 → $354,904high value: 0.12 → $284,885Robot purchase pricelow value: 25000 → $337,706high value: 60000 → $305,762Wage growth per yearlow value: 0.0236 → $308,284high value: 0.0636 → $337,907$322,817low valuehigh valueSource: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/machine-tending/). Modelled estimate, not a fact.

Cost per unit to 2035

Real terms (today's money). Robot hardware follows Wright's law; wages follow each country's history. Shaded band: robots-slow to robots-fast scenarios. Whirrworkによるモデル推計であり、事実ではありません。

Chart単位あたりの人件費 (基本), 単位あたりのロボット費用 (基本), 単位あたりのロボット費用 (ロボット：進歩が速い), 単位あたりのロボット費用 (ロボット：進歩が遅い). Source: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/machine-tending/). Modelled estimate, not a fact.$0.00$10.00$20.00$30.002026202720282029203020312032203320342035USD / tending hourscenario range単位あたりの人件費 (基本)単位あたりのロボット費用 (基本)単位あたりのロボット費用 (ロボット：進歩が速い)単位あたりのロボット費用 (ロボット：進歩が遅い)Source: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/machine-tending/). Modelled estimate,…

逆転する年: すでに

What the spreadsheet misses

安全性
Removes repetitive reaching into machines; risk assessment is still required for cobots.
品質
Consistent load positions; fewer scrapped parts from mis-seating.
柔軟性
High-mix, low-volume shops pay for every changeover.
Edge cases
Chips, coolant and parts that tangle defeat grippers.
Customer experience
Lights-out second shifts shorten lead times.
Jobs and redeployment
Operators become cell technicians; the evidence on robots and local employment is mixed and depends on sector (see our insights).
規制
ISO 10218 and ISO/TS 15066 for collaborative operation; CE marking in the EU.

関連

このページの出典

注記と出典は英語です。英語版が正式な版です。

  1. Universal Robots UR5e cobot arm $39,083-$43,544 (US distributor listing) Automation Distribution, 2026-10 · vendor
  2. Cobot welding price breakdown: integration/commissioning $15,000-$40,000; base system 50-60% of total investment; maintenance 3-5% per year THG Automation (integrator), 2026 · vendor
  3. RaaS machine tending: six-axis robot at about $10 per hour (Formic) Plastics Machinery & Manufacturing, 2026-10
  4. Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (median hourly wage by occupation) U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2025-05
  5. Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026: wages and salaries 70.0% of private-industry compensation (series CMU2020000000000P) U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2026-06
  6. Mean nominal hourly earnings of employees by sex and occupation (ISCO-08), DF_EAR_EHRA_SEX_OCU_CUR_NB ILOSTAT (International Labour Organization), from national labour force and earnings surveys, 2025
  7. Labour cost levels by NACE Rev. 2 activity (lc_lci_lev): Germany 2022-2025, total labour cost vs wages and salaries per hour Eurostat, 2025
  8. Rates and thresholds for employers 2025 to 2026 (employer Class 1 NIC 15% above £5,000) HM Revenue & Customs, 2025-04-06
  9. 令和6年賃金構造基本統計調査 (Basic Survey on Wage Structure 2024), table 1 by occupation Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Japan (via e-Stat), 2024-06
  10. Average monthly earnings of employees by sex and economic activity, DF_EAR_EMTA_SEX_ECO_CUR_NB ILOSTAT (International Labour Organization), 2022
  11. Average annual wage of employed persons in urban units in 2024 (by position and by region) National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2025-05-20
  12. Euro foreign exchange reference rates (cross rates to USD), via Frankfurter European Central Bank, 2026-10-23
  13. Wright, T. P. (1936). Factors affecting the cost of airplanes. Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, 3(4), 122-128 Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, 1936
  14. Nagy, B., Farmer, J. D., Bui, Q. M., & Trancik, J. E. (2013). Statistical basis for predicting technological progress. PLoS ONE, 8(2), e52669 (62 technologies; Wright's law among the best hindcasters; errors grow with horizon) PLoS ONE, 2013