Producing audiobooks is expensive, so the appeal of automating audiobook creation is easy to understand. The traditional process can take two hours or more in the studio for one finished hour, and the average audiobook is eight hours long. A significant factor in the cost is the talent: brand-name talent is paid $1,000 or more per finished hour (PFH) of the audiobook, and with studio time and post-production added, the cost climbs quickly.
Source: AI Comes to Audiobooks