Evaluation of Wireless Connectivity in an Automated Warehouse at 60 GHz

Industry 4.0 autonomous material handling agents demand high-speed indoor network connectivity in warehouses. Wireless interconnections in the 60 GHz bands have been demonstrated to provide multi-gigabit/second data rates in indoor environments. This paper aims to investigate network connectivity in the 60 GHz millimeter-wave band inside an automated warehouse. The challenges to robust and high-speed network connectivity, especially, at mmWave frequencies stem from lots of non-line-of-sight (nLOS) paths between transmitter and receivers caused by obstructing structures such as metal shelves and boxes. The added complexity of dynamic variations in the configuration of the warehouse and the multipath reflections and shadow-fading effects add to the challenges of establishing a stable and reliable yet fast network coverage. In this paper, we evaluate the performance of a 60 GHz wireless network inside a smart warehouse through simulations using Network Simulator-3 (NS-3). We consider a realistic indoor warehouse environment with a large number of metallic shelves and contents with dimensions per material handling standards. Our simulation results show that the performance of the network depends on whether line-of-sight (LOS) and nLOS exists between the agents and the Access Point, the presence of a reflective environment, and the number of autonomous material handling agents (AMHAs) in the warehouse.