by Gary Mintchell | May 15, 2026 | Data Management, Manufacturing IT, Operations Management
This is one of those press releases that have come to me for years that a typical magazine would just republish and call it news but leaves me wishing for much more information. Like who, what, how. The story concerns implementing a Manufacturing Execution System (MES) that enabled doubling of production through the consolidation of data.
I’d love to know more, but this comes from Rockwell Automation—a company who tempts me with cool information but then never follows through. So, if you’re a Rockwell customer checking out their MES solutions, perhaps your account manager can supply you with a deeper look into what appears to be a promising application.
News in brief: Century-old Pacific Northwest co-packer consolidates nine systems into one, achieves 99% inventory accuracy, and wins 2025 Plex Transformer Impact Award
Rockwell Automation announced that Portland Bottling Company (PBC), a leading U.S. West Coast beverage co‑packer, has been named a recipient of the 2025 Plex Transformer Impact Award. PBC earned recognition after doubling its monthly production volume and achieving measurable operational improvements following its deployment of the Plex Smart Manufacturing Platform.
Founded in 1924 and based in Clackamas, Oregon, PBC specializes in ready-to-drink beverages manufactured exclusively in aluminum cans. As customer demand increased, PBC recognized the need for greater operational visibility and control. Prior to implementing Plex in 2020, the company relied on nine disconnected technologies with no single source of truth. Manual inventory processes introduced data errors, limited production insight and reduced the company’s ability to respond quickly to customer needs.
To address these challenges, PBC worked with Plex partner Revolution Group to implement Plex Manufacturing Execution System (MES) — including Plex MES Automation & Orchestration (A&O) and Plex Quality Management System (QMS). By consolidating its technology landscape into one connected platform, PBC provided every department, from production and quality to inventory and maintenance, access to the same real-time operational data, eliminating silos that had previously constrained growth.
“Tracking our customers’ inventory accurately is paramount to our business. Plex enables us to do this efficiently and easily report on-hand balances and warehouse charges,” said Robert Van Blake, IT director, Portland Bottling Company. “Real-time data is a key factor in operational productivity improvements. Prior to Plex, this data was cumbersome to collect and subject to human error.”
The impact of transformation was both immediate and sustained. PBC increased production volumes from 900,000 to two million case equivalents per month. Inventory accuracy reached 99%, while shipping accuracy hit 100%. Productivity improved by 10% and waste dropped by 20% and maintenance response times decreased—enabling the company to scale operations while maintaining quality and customer service.
“Plex MES extends beyond execution to help manufacturers bring greater coordination and visibility across quality, inventory and production,” said Michael Hart, head of industry strategy and growth, Rockwell Automation. “Portland Bottling Company’s transformation brings this to life, showing how a connected operational foundation can drive both efficiency and scalable growth.”
by Gary Mintchell | May 14, 2026 | Generative AI, Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
I devoted three days in April to attend the Aras Community Event (ACE 2026) in Miami, FL. Even though I am not a specialized market analyst in that market, I’ve been involved with the application of product lifecycle management ever since I was “The Kid in Engineering” at a manufacturing company back when, well, I was just a bit older than a “kid.”
Our company (another company that designed and built automated assembly equipment) transitioned to computer-aided design (CAD) while I was in management. Later, I became involved with AutoCAD.
So, there are memories of the great advances in the technology and capabilities.
My first summary of my three days with the Aras community in Miami was recorded on my podcast and YouTube channels. As I wrote at the time, “These PLM events always return me to the time when I did this sort of work–manually. Then my first taste of computers digitizing the bill of materials as a first step in our data management journey.”
Aras product managers showed how LLMs trained on the data within the app along with proper governance worked with agents to perform a number of tasks. Tasks in many cases that would require days of pain-staking work from a human.
While I heard from an analyst in the market that they thought this was all painfully slow, I’d offer the thought that a company does not want to outpace its customers. Most will not want to jump into the deep end immediately.
Chatting with CTO Rob McAveney, I heard how the company is taking a balanced approach to introducing these new technologies assuring that they are bringing their customer base along laying out the progression of “agentification of PLM.” The vision includes turning Aras Innovator into an “enterprise nervous system.”
The pressure of digitalization and the so-called digital transformation of companies drives these developers and suppliers into trying to find solutions to the immense data problems they face. Aras’ core technology lies in the digital thread, a topic often referred to.
Ironically, my discussions with Aras and some customers and prospects during the conference revealed an unhealthy fact that I’ve often heard in another software application market—MES. It seems that few users use the full complement of solutions offered by the vendors. This means that what could be a mature market is actually open for new solutions—meaning an innovative upstart like Aras has opportunity for market growth.
I researched the market using my favorite search engine—Claude.ai. The global PLM & Engineering software market reached $31.1 billion in 2024, growing 9.7% year-over-year, and is projected to hit $41.6 billion by 2029 at a ~6% CAGR. The top 10 vendors account for roughly 85% of the total market.
The leading suppliers include Siemens Digital Industries, Dassault Systèms, PTC, and Autodesk. Analysts report Aras Innovator is built for adaptability, offering a platform designed to evolve quickly with a low-code development environment and strong Digital Thread capabilities.
The four key development points for Aras agentic AI and LLMs, which were repeated often are:
- Trust
- Governance
- Observability
- Explainability
Shortly following the Aras event, I attended virtually the Siemens press conference from Hannover Fair.
Further research between the two revealed these thoughts from a variety of analysts.
Siemens Teamcenter Copilot is powerful but bounded. Siemens’ approach includes Teamcenter Copilot and AI Chat for natural language queries, RapidMiner for spotting quality issues, and AI extraction of procedures from static PDFs. Siemens describes it as “training AI in the language of engineering and manufacturing” — embedding domain-specific intelligence aligned with physics, lifecycle context, and operational constraints.
However, what Siemens is doing is focused, practical, and grounded in helping users navigate data Siemens already manages well. The copilots do not attempt to extend beyond Teamcenter — they do not ingest data from other PLM tools or external systems that influence product decisions, and the improvements remain confined to the boundaries of one platform.
Aras’s approach is architecturally more open. InnovatorEdge is designed so that product data, processes, and digital thread remain governed inside the core platform, while Edge services make them consumable everywhere else — enabling agents to link data across PLM, ERP, IoT, and documents.
One independent analyst commentary summarized the broader landscape bluntly: all four major PLM vendors — Siemens, Dassault, PTC, and Aras — are adding AI inside their products, but none of them are rethinking PLM architecture for an agent-native future. They are embedding assistants inside old systems rather than redesigning systems around the needs of agents. That said, Aras’s open, low-code, API-first architecture puts it structurally closer to an agent-ready foundation than Siemens’s more monolithic platform.
ACE attendees noted that while AI’s transformative potential was clear, discussions also centered on the need for human oversight, data governance, and addressing concerns about traceability and the dynamic nature of LLMs — suggesting customers are excited but appropriately cautious about full autonomy.
by Gary Mintchell | May 13, 2026 | Generative AI
The world of AI and Agents seemingly focuses on OpenAI and Anthropic thanks to their leaders’ bold dystopian statements. There are others—even ones who have application in manufacturing.
Google sent me a rare piece of news from it’s recent annual user conference, Google Cloud Next ’26, held in Las Vegas. Not to be outdone, Google has Gemini. During the conference GE Appliances announced it is using Gemini Enterprise to deploy over 800 AI agents across its manufacturing, logistics, and supply chain operations, putting AI into the hands of the people closest to the work.
OK, I just attended a conference where two active agents were demonstrated with several more on the way. Somehow 800 seems like more than can be managed. But, that’s what they say.
I may not have heard much about GE Appliances since my company built a helium mass spectroscopy testing machine for their “factory of the future” in 1985.
I keep telling people that I don’t want theory. Actual applications, no matter how small, are more interesting to me. Here are three examples provided by Google and GE Appliances:
- Manufacturing: GE Appliances embedded Gemini Enterprise into its Brilliant Factory manufacturing data platform, which has enabled agents to analyze shift data in minutes rather than hours, allow employees to talk to production data to diagnose issues quickly, and provide live view of line yields and equipment health to reduce downtime.
- Logistics: GE Appliances used Gemini Enterprise to build its Quality Insights AI tool for AI-assisted analysis which has yielded measurable results, uncovering millions of dollars in improvement opportunities across customer logistics and internal operations.
- Supply Chain: GE Appliances introduced a Supplier Collaboration Agent to manage communication with more than 600 suppliers. This agent automated order status inquiries, leading to a 25% reduction in backorders and allowing the team to focus on high-value strategic growth.
by Gary Mintchell | May 12, 2026 | Automation, Edge, Generative AI
Immediately following my trip to a software conference featuring AI solutions, I attended an online press conference from Siemens at Hannover Fair. I’ve attended it in person several times over the years. This year Siemens held the press conference (with fewer than usual journalists) at their stand instead of a great hall that featured dinner following.
Siemens featured AI and agents introducing us to Eigen. They are tied to Microsoft Copilot for their solutions. I was more impressed by the Aras deep dives into governance than Siemens’ ignoring of that topic.
There were many announcements.
Industrial AI Suite and WinCC Unified now with general availability
- Enhanced cybersecurity: IEC 62443-4-2-certified security functions and air-gapped operation for critical infrastructures
- Industrial Information Hub with bidirectional data flow and ARM support for flexible, decentralized applications
- Growing partner ecosystem: New partner solutions for machine vision, quality inspection and robust industrial hardware
The Industrial AI Suite, based on Industrial Edge, is now generally available. It simplifies the entire AI lifecycle and enables embedding industrial AI via a complete infrastructure, easily scaling AI models and managing them across locations. The Industrial AI Suite supports a wide range of AI-based applications such as predictive maintenance and visual inspection to reduce downtime and sustainably increase production quality. In the latest version, the Industrial AI Suite also enables significantly more effective AI model retraining by allowing customers to combine image data with production data from MES systems or controllers.
Industrial Edge Management version 2.0 combines a redesigned, more user friendly and efficient user interface with enhanced data management and security for distributed infrastructures. At the same time, the platform now supports additional hypervisors such as OpenShift and Hyper-V, enabling Siemens Industrial Edge to be operated flexibly on existing IT infrastructures. Siemens thus bridges the requirements of both the IT and OT worlds.
IEC 62443-4-2-certified security functions for critical infrastructures, including air-gapped operation in which systems are physically isolated from external networks, are targeted for release in the second half of 2026 and are expected to provide enhanced cybersecurity. The high security and data management capabilities have been independently confirmed. Testing institute UL Solutions has awarded Siemens Industrial Edge and the virtual PLC the “Smart Systems Verified – Platinum” certification, evaluating six key categories: connectivity and interoperability, control and automation, digital experience, functional value, resilience, and cybersecurity.
The Industrial Information Hub has been fundamentally expanded. The data management solution enables bidirectional data flow: data models can now be synchronized in parallel between edge devices and central IT systems in both directions. This opens up new IT/OT integration scenarios. In addition, the new version of the Industrial Information Hub is available on ARM-based devices such as the SIMATIC IOT2050, which can, for example, be operated on battery power, with LTE-based wireless networking planned for a future release. Thanks to energy-efficient operation, this also means edge applications can be implemented at locations without permanent power supply. These innovations are particularly relevant for decentralized SCADA applications in logistics, water and waste management, or for renewable energy.
New partner solutions are also expanding the Industrial Edge ecosystem. Together with 36Zero Vision, MVTec and Basler, solutions are being developed in the areas of machine vision and quality inspection. From AI-driven defect detection and no-code image processing to modularly deployable image processing and analysis functions, companies can integrate machine vision use cases into manufacturing in a scalable manner.
Eigen
Siemens brings AI to the physical world with Eigen Engineering Agent
- New class of industrial AI product moves beyond AI-powered guidance to autonomous task completion
- Now commercially available, Eigen Engineering Agent delivers up to 50 percent efficiency gains in automation engineering tasks
- Latest milestone in Siemens’ announced €1 billion industrial AI investment advances company’s AI-centric growth strategy
The Eigen Engineering Agent is production-ready and available to the more than 600,000 users of Siemens’ Totally Integrated Automation Engineering platform, TIA Portal. It is part of the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio and is digitally available now.
The Eigen Engineering Agent takes its name from the German word “eigen.” While the word translates to “one’s own,” engineers know it best through concepts like “eigenvalues,” which are properties that remain constant even as everything around them transforms. As the AI landscape transforms rapidly and physical AI matures, the Eigen Engineering Agent is designed to be that constant: a steady source of intelligence, rooted in Siemens’ industrial heritage and capable of carrying out real work.
by Gary Mintchell | May 11, 2026 | Edge, Industrial Computers
Industrial automation suppliers are scrambling for advanced compute edge solutions, often through partnerships rather than acquisition. This is the first of Siemens announcements from the recently held Hannover Messe.
Industrial computing and edge AI specialists, OnLogic, and technology company Siemens, a global leader in automation and digitalization, have announced a strategic partnership to extend the Siemens Industrial Edge (IE) ecosystem into “Extreme Edge” environments where standard hardware cannot survive. By combining Siemens Industrial Edge with OnLogic fanless, ruggedized edge computing hardware, the collaboration empowers customers in minerals, energy, and distributed infrastructure to digitize critical assets that have been previously unreachable.
Here are a few of the features sought out for rugged applications.
Modern distributed infrastructure relies on processing data directly at the point of origin, including high-vibration conveyor belts, wash-down floors, and other locations that would challenge or destroy traditional technology solutions. OnLogic devices act as the “rugged armor” for the Siemens IE “brain”, featuring advanced thermal management, interference-limiting enclosures, and capabilities like customizable I/O to pull data from 30-year-old legacy equipment into modern Siemens apps.
Here are a few features:
- Zero-touch scalability and sustainability
- The integrated solution accelerates time-to-value through systems compatible with Siemens Industrial Edge.
- Plug-and-play deployment: OnLogic units support zero-touch provisioning via the Siemens Industrial Edge Management (IEM) platform, enabling rapid global scaling of containerized apps.
- Actionable sustainability: The low-wattage, high-efficiency design of OnLogic hardware helps customers reduce Scope 3 emissions while delivering long product lifecycles to reduce e-waste, helping to make the Siemens DEGREE sustainability standards actionable.
