Why are manufacturers failing to make the most of predictive engineering?

Enterprise business solutions provider, HSO, has conducted a study revealing that 54% of managers in the manufacturing industry believe their business is not effectively using predictive engineering technology. This technology has been hailed as a leading industry trend – so why is it failing to be more widely adopted?

With the Internet of Things and predictive analytics software on the rise, it’s also startling to discover that just 15.2% of respondents consider predictive engineering a business priority for the next five years. A quarter of the 250 managers involved in the study feel that a lack of integrated technology across departments is a main reason for the lack of implementation.

Despite this worrying negativity, the survey did at least reveal that four in 10 manufacturing managers believe the rise of IoT technology is crucial to help drive predictive engineering, with AI and machine learning also being rated as important factors.

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55.6% of the manufacturers that are already using predictive engineering to improve efficiency say they are benefitting from significant cost reductions, with 44.8% seeing an increase in the speed of product development.

Mark Breeden, Senior Account Manager at HSO commented: “It is surprising to find that a large majority of managers within the manufacturing industry feel that their firm is failing to successfully implement predictive engineering technology.

“The research indicates that this is a missed opportunity for businesses with many respondents that use predictive engineering revealing significant cost reductions and increased product development.

“Manufacturers need the tools to understand key intelligence that will help them be proactive rather than reactive which will help to improve efficiencies across the production chain. Hopefully, the rise of IoT and AI technology will mean that more businesses will begin to reap the rewards of implementing predictive engineering programmes.”