Automation Suppliers Evolve Service Offerings

来源：Controldesign

Once built into the hardware costs, automation services are now becoming a separate revenue source for automation suppliers, in the face of declining hardware margins.

Users have come to realize that even in-house services have a cost and, in some cases, they have to pay a premium for them. Increasingly, they are outsourcing more and more of these service functions to automation suppliers. Automation suppliers and users alike are still adjusting to this transition, but the end result could have a significant impact on manufacturers’ bottom lines.

Service is the fastest growing segment of the automation market today, and with good reason. The vast pools of engineering expertise that used to exist at major user companies have shrunk to critically low levels. Many of the automation services that are required throughout the lifecycle of a plant can no longer be performed in-house. Users are looking to the next logical choice for these services—the suppliers that provide them with the automation products, systems and software that keep their plants running.

The adoption of standard commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) products and components drastically reduced the cost of hardware and eliminated most of the proprietary competitive advantage that automation suppliers could build into their hardware. With hardware no longer a competitive differentiator, suppliers looked to their software and service offerings, as well as vertical industry expertise, to make up for the losses experienced in the hardware business. The scope of services offered has widened considerably over the past several years. Services have emerged as a lucrative business addition. When coupled with areas requiring high domain expertise, they can generate high margin business for suppliers.

From Supplier to Contractor

More suppliers today are taking on the task of supervising entire automation implementation projects, acting as the main automation vendor or contractor that coordinates activities among the systems integrators, smaller suppliers and the user. This simplifies things for the user because the main aut