Economic impact of automation in maintenance processes for the manufacturing industry in Colombia:

Abstract

Introduction: Nowadays, diverse manufacturing companies are faced towards the dilemma of whether investing in automation technologies or not, due to the uncertainty when it comes to remuneration in the profitability of the company, on another hand the level of maintenance management at manufacturing companies is insufficient inside the Latin American region.   Methods: For the build-up of this article, literature review was taken into account.   Results: In this bibliographic review the different tools, techniques and processes of automation in processes regarding industrial maintenance are taken discussed, in addition cases of different companies that have implemented automation technologies in their maintenance management are shown, ultimately statistics and data related to the subject in question focusing special attention on Colombian manufacturing companies will be presented, all this in order to give a panoramic vision of the economic impact of automation immersed in industrial maintenance and concurrently take a glance at a horizon of automation in Colombian manufacturing industries.   Conclusions: Although investments in automation technologies have generated profits for companies, these are often high, in addition to costs related to training company staff to properly carry out these processes. It is therefore suggested that companies that desire to start integrating automation technologies into maintenance processes should do so progressively so as not to generate frustrations in relation to the investment.