Industrial Automation: Understanding the Potential Disappointment Behind Recent Global Advancements

Abstract

Over the past several decades, the global economy has undergone a significant transformation, primarily driven by advancements in automation and robotics. This paper aims to examine recent progress in manufacturing automation and shed light on potential challenges that contribute to the observed disparities in automation adoption. Despite the limitations imposed by a lack of comprehensive statistical data, this analysis has yielded several significant insights. These include insufficient investment in automation, variations in enterprise size structure, and ongoing disparities in labor costs and productivity. Of these factors, the latter appears to be the primary obstacle to rapid industrial automation, as it encourages the reshoring of manufacturing operations to home countries and offshoring to medium- and low-income economies.