Business Wire

WI-ROCKWELL-AUTOMATION

Share
New State of Smart Manufacturing Study Finds Over 40% of Manufacturers Struggle to Outpace Competitors Due to Lack of Technology and Skilled Workforce

Rockwell Automation, Inc. (NYSE: ROK), the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation, today announced the results of the 8th annual “State of Smart Manufacturing Report.” The global study surveyed more than 1,350 manufacturers across 13 of the leading manufacturing countries.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230314005374/en/

To view this piece of content from mms.businesswire.com, please give your consent at the top of this page.

Rockwell Automation announced the results of the 8th annual “State of Smart Manufacturing Report” (Photo: Business Wire)

This year’s report reveals a focus on delivering profitable growth without sacrificing quality, an emphasis on accessing data’s true potential, and increasing adoption of technology to build resilience, enable agility, increase sustainability, and address workforce challenges.

Key global findings include:

  • Twice as many manufacturers believe their organization lacks the technology needed to outpace the competition, as compared to 2022.
  • 4 out of 5 manufacturers still lack an end-to-end supply chain planning solution.
  • Cybersecurity risks rank highest as the obstacle respondents are looking to mitigate with smart manufacturing initiatives.
  • 45% of manufacturers cite “improving quality” as the main positive outcome they want to achieve with smart manufacturing initiatives.
  • 89% of manufacturers plan to maintain or grow employment due to technology adoption. Additionally, 36% of respondents believe they will be able to repurpose existing workers due to their increasing use of technology.
  • Of the 95% of manufacturers who have formal or informal ESG policies in place, 42% cite “improving efficiencies” as the top driving factor for pursuing ESG initiatives.

“Manufacturers are continuing to seek opportunities for profitable growth but are realizing that uncertainty in workforce availability is impacting quality, along with their ability to meet evolving customer needs,” said Veena Lakkundi, senior vice president, Corporate Strategy and Development, Rockwell Automation. “The survey found that smart manufacturing technology is enabling manufacturers of all sizes to optimize more resilient, agile, and sustainable solutions that accelerate transformation. If we’ve learned anything from history, it’s that organizations that invest in innovation, with a bias for action, during times of uncertainty can outpace competitors.”

Based on the survey findings, technology is crucial to mitigating risk and delivering growth. However, for one-third of manufacturers, the range of available systems and platforms is leading to “technology paralysis” – an inability to decide between solutions. Manufacturers can overcome this indecision by choosing a partner with relevant industry expertise and experience who can advise and guide them in implementing a fit-for-purpose solution to achieve desired outcomes.

“At Rockwell, we combine the power of our portfolio of industry solutions with our second-to-none partner ecosystem to serve as a trusted advisor to leading companies around the world,” said Lakkundi. “As the biggest company focused solely on industrial automation and digital transformation, we work to make the complex simple and meet companies where they are in their journeys.”

The full findings of the report can be found here.

Methodology

This report analyzed feedback from 1,353 respondents from 13 of the top manufacturing countries with roles from management up to the C-suite and was conducted in association with Sapio Research and Plex Systems. The survey covered discrete, process, and hybrid industries across a balanced distribution of company sizes with revenues spanning $10 million to over $10 billion, providing a wide breadth of manufacturing business perspectives.

About Rockwell Automation

Rockwell Automation, Inc. (NYSE: ROK) is a global leader in industrial automation and digital transformation. We connect the imaginations of people with the potential of technology to expand what is humanly possible, making the world more productive and more sustainable. Headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Rockwell Automation employs approximately 26,000 problem solvers dedicated to our customers in more than 100 countries. To learn more about how we are bringing the Connected Enterprise to life across industrial enterprises, visit www.rockwellautomation.com.

To view this piece of content from cts.businesswire.com, please give your consent at the top of this page.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230314005374/en/

About Business Wire

Business Wire
Business Wire
101 California Street, 20th Floor
CA 94111 San Francisco

http://businesswire.com
DK

Subscribe to releases from Business Wire

Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Latest releases from Business Wire

Nominations open for The MIDORI Prize for Biodiversity 2026 by AEON Environmental Foundation and the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity16.1.2026 09:00:00 CET | Press release

The MIDORI Prize recognizes outstanding individual contributions to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversityThe unique prize contributes to raising public awareness of the essential role biodiversity plays for human well-being and in addressing global challenges such as climate changeThe Award Ceremony and Award Winners Forum will be held on 27 August 2026 in Tokyo, Japan The call for nominations for The MIDORI Prize for Biodiversity 2026 is open from 2 February to 31 March 2026. Nominations are invited from members of the public through the AEON Environmental Foundation website at https://www.aeonkankyozaidan.or.jp/en/prize/. The Award Ceremony and Award Winners Forum of the 2026 edition of the Prize will be held on 27 August in Tokyo, Japan. These events will contribute to the global mobilization around COP 17 of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which will take place in Yerevan (Armenia) under the theme of “Taking action for Nature”. Co-organized by the AEON

Tigo Energy and Weco Certify MLPE-Inverter Compatibility to Simplify PV System Design16.1.2026 06:00:00 CET | Press release

Tigo MLPE technology and hybrid inverters of Italian manufacturer Weco are now certified to work together to enhance design flexibility, system performance, and seamless integration. Tigo Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ: TYGO) (“Tigo” or “Company”), a leading provider of intelligent solar and energy software solutions, today announced the Company has signed a certificate of compatibility with Weco S.r.l., documenting the compatibility between Tigo Flex MLPE products and hybrid solar inverters from Weco. The certification covers certain single-phase and three-phase Weco products and members of the Tigo TS4-A and TS4-X product families, when properly designed and installed. Together, these products are designed to deliver high-quality, enhanced value through a system that generates and manages solar energy more efficiently and delivers the features residential energy customers demand. “The compatibility between our inverter solutions and Tigo optimizers represents a significant step forward for the

Binarly to Unveil “Broken Trust” Research: Firmware Bypass Chains, BMC Persistence, and EDR Evasion15.1.2026 23:04:00 CET | Press release

Binarly, the industry leader in software and firmware supply-chain security, today announced an upcoming DistrictCon presentation “Broken Trust: Firmware Bypass Chains, BMC Persistence, and EDR Evasion.” The session will detail how firmware-level attack chains observed in shipped enterprise devices can effectively undermine modern endpoint defenses, enabling stealthy compromise and long-lived persistence. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260115834965/en/ Binarly Unveils Broken Trust Research: Firmware Bypass, BMC Persistence In this presentation, the Binarly REsearch team will dismantle the assumption of hardware trust by presenting multiple real-world firmware bypass chains. Alex Matrosov and Fabio Pagani will provide a deep dive into the specific vulnerability classes and exploitation primitives that make these attacks reliable in practice. The team will also deliver a live demonstration compromising a fully

Coolbrook Named on the 2026 Global Cleantech 10015.1.2026 18:14:00 CET | Press release

Coolbrook, a transformational technology and engineering company on a mission to decarbonise major industrial sectors like petrochemicals and chemicals, iron and steel, aluminium, and cement, has been named on Cleantech Group’s 2026 Global Cleantech 100. This annual list recognizes companies poised to deliver market-ready solutions that advance a cleaner, more resilient global future. The report highlights innovators addressing some of the world’s most urgent environmental and infrastructure challenges. The complimentary report introduces you to innovators advancing groundbreaking technologies and business models to enable us to act on the ever-increasing climate and environmental crisis. Following a 2025 marked by geopolitical volatility and shifting economic signals, the global cleantech ecosystem enters 2026 with slightly greater certainty - yet heightened competitive pressure. Growth is concentrating around two dominant themes: AI infrastructure and critical minerals. “The 2026 Glo

World Economic Forum and Salesforce Empower Global Leaders With First-of-its-Kind Agentic Assistant for the 2026 Annual Meeting in Davos15.1.2026 18:01:00 CET | Press release

The Forum activates its vast data stores through Agentforce 360, enabling a level of preparation and decision-making for its over 3,000 attendees previously unachievable by human processing alone Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), the world’s #1 CRM, today announced the activation of the World Economic Forum’s institutional knowledge powered by Agentforce 360 to support over 3,000 of the world’s most influential leaders at the 2026 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting. The Forum has launched a new proactive, high-precision concierge app, “EVA,” built on the Agentforce 360 Platform, Salesforce’s agentic platform. EVA will empower attendees to move beyond traditional information access, with an AI agent that doesn’t just answer questions, but can reason, prioritize, and act on a leader’s behalf for the 2026 Annual Meeting. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260115571119/en/ Scheduled for January 19–23 in Davos, Switzerland, th

In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.

Visit our pressroom
World GlobeA line styled icon from Orion Icon Library.HiddenA line styled icon from Orion Icon Library.Eye