Fleet-sizing simulator: how many cleaning robots your site needs, and which ones

The simulator applies the method we use at the demonstration, with market rates in place of on-site measurements. It does not replace the demonstration; it prepares for it.

1. The robot-ready share. On any site, part of the floor is not done by a robot: edges and skirting boards, washrooms, stairs, cluttered areas, small rooms. This share ranges from 10% on an open logistics platform to 40% in enclosed offices; the simulator derives it from the site type and the clutter level. The rest is the robot-ready floor area.

2. The robot family. Floor covering, soiling and floor area point to the family: an autonomous floor scrubber or a multifunction robot on hard floors that need scrubbing, a sweeper for debris and production dust, an autonomous vacuum on carpet, a compact multifunction robot on a mixed site, and a compact operator-assisted scrubber below 800 m². When the floor needs sweeping and then scrubbing, two families are proposed. Our market robot guide lists every model in each family.

3. Observed productivity. Each family has a rated productivity (700 to 1,000 m²/h for a compact multifunction robot, 1,500 to 2,000 for a large-format floor scrubber, 1,800 for a sweeper, 1,400 for a vacuum), which the simulator reduces to 50 to 65% depending on clutter, as explained in our comparison of robots for business.

4. The usable shift. The available time slot, bounded by runtime and the docking station (a floor scrubber with a station runs two cycles back to back over a night; in the daytime, two to three usable hours), gives the robot hours per shift; the robot-ready area divided by observed productivity and by the shift gives the number of robots, rounded up. Several levels without a lift require one robot per level; with a lift, one robot can cover several if the model integrates with it (see our interoperability study).

5. Operative hours. The area that cannot be robotised, at market manual rates (150 to 250 m²/h in offices, 60 to 100 m²/h in washrooms), plus 15 to 30 minutes of robot handling per shift, give the remaining operative hours, the ones described on our page about cobotics. The simulator gives no price: our total cost of ownership guide gives the orders of magnitude, and we explain how we cost a project when you get in touch.