Automation Services

Key Findings

• COVID speeds up adoption but is not changing direction.
• Around 30% of services is attributed to hardware (spare parts, etc.).
• In future, a large share of services will come from digital services.
• The technical prerequisites for digital transformation are mainly given.
• End users tend to be cautious, when it comes to digital services.
• For end users costs/pricing and measurable outcome are key.
• Large companies are leading the digitalization journey and especially large automation companies are key players in the service ecosystem.
• Partly strong differences in offering between suppliers as well as between OEMs and other companies.  Small companies have less capabilities for digitalization services.
• Digital services are expected to grow fast, while traditional service will continue with modest growth.
• Big trend towards outsourcing has ended, further additional outsourcing is driven by cost and strategy.​

Sample

• We received above 200 responses for the English survey + 50 responses in Chinese.  The overall sample is large enough to have significant results.
• We must mention that this survey was performed in English as well as in Chinese.
  • All English responses on company HQ are presented as answered
  • After analysis of the individual Chinese responses, we decided to present them as “emerging Asia,” as they represent the Chinese market view
• Many of the end user results come from the members of ARC’s Digital Transformation Council: https://www.arcweb.com/digital-transformation-council
• End user results have a high share of process industries, and we must take this into account when interpreting the results.

• There were three different tracks for questions:
  • Suppliers
  • Machine builders, system integrators, and EPCs
  • End Users
  • Overall, the participation rate of machine builders/EPCs/System integrators was low and not statistically significant / reliable for a detailed analysis for all questions.  Hence, we will only present analysis for this group, when answers are distinct.
• Whenever meaningful, we kept the questions identical.
• Color Code:
  • Blue means the analysis is for suppliers
  • Yellow is Machine builders, system integrators, and EPCs
  • Green is for end users
  • Grey means that it is a combined analysis​

Current Market

• Traditional services are basically a must have for most companies and almost, especially spare parts, maintenance, and field services.
• Services that require special know-how and/or manpower, such as turnkey plants, cloud-based data services, are offered by much smaller number of players.
• Dedicated digitalization services are even rarer, on the one side, there is less offering, but apparently also end users demand it less frequently.​

​

• Especially for the first four services mentioned in the chart, we have a high market saturation and a diverse offering.
• Machine builders
  • Focus more on traditional services.
  • Many do not have the manpower and know-how and continue with basic offering.
  • Often smaller companies, which do not have the capacity and strategy to move into plant wide contracts or turnkey solutions.
  • Know-how is often limited on own machinery and not plant wide solutions.
• End users and suppliers show almost identical pattern in terms of supply and demand.​

Table of Contents

• Sample​
• Current Market​
• Growth and COVID Impact​
• Digital Transformation​
• EaaS​
• Ecosystem​

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