Between headlines touting the latest artificial intelligence achievements, new legislation and policies aimed at stimulating growth in manufacturing, and a dearth in skilled job applicants, more and more manufacturers are turning to advanced technologies to solve their challenges and seize opportunities. But what solutions are setting up long-term success for them – and you?
Before exploring some trends and technologies that manufacturers may use going forward, it is probably worthwhile to review what some of the best manufacturers are doing right now. So, we turn to some of the results of the Top Shops program conducted by Gardner Business Media. Now in its 14th year, the benchmarking survey has earned more than a slight amount of credibility associated with its findings – to put it mildly.
For 2025, GBM found that the industry’s top shops don’t just have newer equipment than the other shops (7 1/2 years versus 10 years), they run the equipment more (15 hours per day versus 8 1/2 hours) and make more with it ($350,000 in sales per machine versus $183,000). It is also worth noting that top shops produce less scrap and rework (0.9% versus 2.4%); their first-pass quality yield is better (95% versus 90%); and customers get their deliveries on time more often (94% versus 86%).
Which brings us to the equipment utilized by the top shops. As it turns out, while all shops have similar equipment, top shops have more of it than other shops:
Vertical Machining Centers: 94% vs. 80%
Horizontal Turning Centers: 89% vs. 74%
Horizontal Machining Centers: 67% vs. 50%
Turn-Mill/Multitasking: 69% vs. 44%
Twin-Spindle Turning: 53% vs. 37%
Despite a high level of similarity (although the delta between the use of multitasking machines is notable in top shops), equipment utilization – in terms of setup, load/unload, and tooling – makes a big difference: 71% of top shops perform lights-out/unattended machining, while the others are at just 54%. That helps explain the difference in spindle utilization – 74% at top shops and 60% at others. After all, if the spindle isn’t turning, parts (and revenue) aren’t being made.
And Then Robots…
Another enabler for lights-out/unattended machining – one that also works when the lights are on – is robots. But even at the top shops, there are significantly fewer than you might expect: Only 54% of top shops use robots for part loading/unloading. That shrinks to just 27% for other shops.
Ryan Kelly, vice president, technology at AMT, said, “A lot of manufacturers are interested in flexible automation, but they don’t want to leverage robotics in a fixed system; they want to be able to move the robot from station to station on a mobile base.”
However, robot deployment in a shop presents some issues for manufacturers. Kelly said that, for many shops, robots are still too expensive. And if a decision is made to add robotic automation, the time between making that decision and deployment is too long. What’s more, small and medium-sized operations generally don’t have people to spearhead these automation projects, which can require a substantial amount of time.
So, Kelly said, the cost of implementation needs to come down; the time for deployment needs to collapse; and the overall ease of use of robots needs to improve.
He said that he sees a lot of evidence that things are moving in that direction.
Amazon’s Vulcan robot has a sense of touch for carefully handling items. (Image: Amazon)
The Amazon Effect
One of the places where Kelly looks is probably a place that most people at shops – top ones and others alike – don’t look: Amazon.
Amazon operates more than 300 facilities worldwide that utilize robots – both commercial models you likely recognize and robots that Amazon itself is developing. With more than a million robots, the company claims to be “the world’s largest manufacturer and operator of mobile robots.” Its fleet of robots includes Hercules, which can lift and move 1,250 pounds of inventory, and Proteus, a fully autonomous mobile robot that can move heavy carts full of goods and maneuver around employees while doing so.
With so many robots in its facilities, Amazon has developed DeepFleet to coordinate traffic and avoid congestion. The company calculates that this suite of AI-based foundation models improves the travel time of the fleet by 10%.
Additionally, Amazon recently announced the development of Blue Jay, which it describes as a “next-generation robotics system that coordinates multiple robotic arms to perform many tasks at once.” While this may not be useful in a physical shop – after all, Amazon fulfillment centers have high-speed conveyors that move thousands of items – conceptually, it is: Blue Jay consolidates three robotic workstations into one.
Another example of what is sometimes referred to as “physical AI” (AI that works with machines, such as robots or vehicles, to perform tasks in the real world, as opposed to the digital space) is Vulcan, a robot with a sense of touch. Its end effector includes force feedback sensors, so it knows when it makes contact with an object and how much force is being applied. Vision allows it to see items in a container; a rod allows it to move the items, creating space for new items or to allow accessibility for removal, which is performed by a suction cup on the end effector. While Vulcan can handle about 75% of the items processed in Amazon fulfillment centers, it is smart enough to know when it can or can’t perform its required tasks. When it encounters something it can’t handle, it alerts human employees for help.
Although these systems are developed for warehouse situations, they are likely to lead to a proliferation of operations, including in manufacturing.
Architecturally, the robots being used at Amazon are either like the ones being used in manufacturing operations (e.g., 6-axis arms) or are flat and have wheels (for carrying things on their surfaces).
Optimus under its “skin.” It probably isn’t coming to a shop near you anytime soon. (Image: Tesla)
Humanoids: $erious — For Now
A lot of attention is being paid to humanoid robots. One might even conclude that their mass adoption is just around the corner.
However, Dayton Horvath, AMT’s director, emerging technology and investment, pointed out that a huge data set is required to make robots do human-like tasks in a human-like way. This means a lot of resources – both digital and financial. Consequently, they’re likely only to be used by companies that have the wherewithal to address the high cost of implementation – companies like Amazon.
AI is all the buzz, but it needs to be contextualized. For example, Stellantis, a company with the resources for AI, is rolling out the technology in its factories for use in vision systems, machine data monitoring, machine diagnostics, part-picking optimization, and other tasks.
So, before we get to AI-powered humanoids, there is still a way to go.
Horvath said the ubiquity of cobots – collaborative robots – will grow over the next two to three years as they become easier to use.
Scanning a door panel at the Detroit Assembly Complex – Jefferson. AI can help improve quality. (Image: Stellantis)
Smart Manufacturing Matters
A 2025 Deloitte survey of 600 executives from manufacturing companies larger than those in GBM’s Top Shops survey indicated a tremendous interest in smart manufacturing, including the deployment of factory automation hardware, data analytics, active sensors, vision systems, robotics, IoT platforms, wearables, and cloud computing.
Notably, 92% of those surveyed responded that smart manufacturing will be the main driver of competitiveness over the next three years, and 85% said a smart manufacturing initiative “will transform how products are made, improve agility, and attract new manufacturing talent.”
That last item, talent – people – cannot be underestimated. Deloitte conducted a study in 2024 that projected a need for 3.8 million net new employees in manufacturing by 2033 to meet labor demands. Since the study was conducted before the Trump administration enacted the current reciprocal tariffs to encourage more domestic manufacturing, that figure may be an underestimation. According to the “2025 Reshoring Survey Report” from the Reshoring Initiative and Regions Recruiting, “Even without a surge in reshoring, 2.1 million manufacturing jobs are forecast to go unfilled by 2030.”
Deloitte’s 2025 smart manufacturing survey also uncovered that about 70% of respondents have “moderate to significant challenges” in hiring skilled people for IT, OT (operational technology), data science and engineering, application development, and cybersecurity. And this is today.
What To Do
Whether for operational improvements and their consequent financial benefits or as part of the smart manufacturing efforts that many companies are deploying, it is clear that the businesses that will succeed going forward not only recognize the need to use advanced technology but actually find it, acquire it, and use it. To that end, IMTS 2026, which will be held Sept. 14-19 at McCormick Place in Chicago, is an excellent place to start your journey toward implementing advanced technology in your operations.
Although overall market uncertainty continues to be largely driven by geopolitics, a few things are absolutely clear, like the need to manufacture more products in the United States – efficiently manufactured. Otherwise, an affordability issue arises among consumers.
While public attention seems to focus on AI, improved fundamentals, like implementing unattended machining, are opportunities that can make a huge difference.
To read the rest of the Industry Updates Issue of MT Magazine, click here.
