What can app-based automation do for manufacturing?

The shift toward open, app-based control architectures marks a major departure from traditional closed systems. Inspired by smartphone design, modern automation platforms now support customizable, modular applications that can be tailored to specific processes, Automation World wrote.

This gives engineers new tools to optimize operations, implement predictive maintenance and integrate seamlessly with broader digital infrastructure.

Key technologies, such as Linux-based operating systems, centralized data layers and connectivity standards, enable real-time and non-real-time data exchange, making it easier to monitor, adjust and scale processes across single or multiple facilities. The result is not just improved throughput and uptime, but also enhanced visibility into machine performance, enabling smarter deployment of human resources.

The scalability and remote accessibility offered by this architecture are especially valuable to engineers managing complex or distributed manufacturing systems. Data-driven insights from vision systems, PLCs and app-based monitoring tools allow for early detection of anomalies and component-level diagnostics, reducing downtime and scrap.

Learn more in the full article from Automation World, a Control Design partner publication.