Journal of Manufacturing Systems

• In the commercially available offer, current systems almost all work fully centralized lacking flexibility, robustness, and scalability. But a trend towards a decentralized control is emerging. • The abundance of literature shows us that many algorithms already exist for the control of AGV systems in lab environments, both central and decentral. • The industry 4.0 paradigm will push AGV manufacturers to think about decentralization as systems will become even larger and complex. • More decentralized and market-based techniques are suited to introduce flexibility and scalability in the system. • The control of an AGV system can be decomposed into five core tasks which are task allocation, navigation, path planning , motion planning and vehicle management.

Automated guided vehicle systems, state-of-the-art control algorithms and techniques