When it comes to integrating their factory floor devices and systems with higher-level enterprise business systems, U.S. manufacturers and their European counterparts share many business and technology goals. But when it comes to actually accomplishing this often-difficult work, European industrial companies are much further along in their integration activities and expect to complete them sooner than U.S. enterprises.

Nevertheless, many European manufacturers, echoing the sentiments of U.S. companies, report that plant floor to enterprise systems integration is often more challenging than they had expected. They, too, have to contend with often-nettlesome organizational and cultural issues, as well as diffuse management responsibility for integration projects in their companies. As a result, integration project delays are even more common in European manufacturing companies than they are in U.S. companies.

These are just some of the findings of the latest Managing Automation reader poll on plant floor to enterprise business systems integration, the magazine's sixth such study since 2001. This year also marks the first extension of the poll to the European manufacturing market, which has been done under the auspices of MA's new pan-European sister publication, called Manufacturing Executive, that will debut this month. Nearly 300 MA readers in the United States and about 200 Manufacturing Executive readers in Europe weighed in this year on the state of integration in their companies, as well as their business and technology goals and the barriers they face in accomplishing the work.

Last year, U.S. poll respondents indicated that they were prepared to spend more money on integration projects even as they were grappling with organizational and cultural issues related to the work. This year again, just more than one-third of U.S. poll respondents, and 29% of European poll takers, indicated that they would have to spend more money over the next two to three years on integration projects.

The spending intentions underscore the back-and-forth nature of plant floor to enterprise business systems integration work. On one hand, the work is technologically complex and often saddled with organizational and people issues that result in agonizingly slow progress and even delays (chart 8). On the other hand, the business imperatives dependent on successfully accomplishing the work — increasing the speed of product development, improving customer service, and cutting downtime, among others — require ongoing determination, money, and sustained management commitment. The tension is real and reflected in many parts of both polls.

But European companies appear to be dealing with the tension more effectively than U.S. entities, and one reason may be that more European companies are committed to the idea. While a sizable majority of U.S. companies — nearly 74% this year — say they have established plant floor to enterprise systems integration as a corporate objective, a significantly higher number — 93% — of Europeans report their embrace of that goal. And the strength of that commitment carries through in the details.

When asked to measure their companies' progress in achieving integration, for example, only about 15% of U.S. respondents say this year that the integration work has been substantially completed. A mid-teens percentage response to this question has persisted in the poll for several years, once again underscoring the difficulty of the work. A far larger percentage — 28% — of European companies, however, report that substantial progress has been made. On other measures of the integration activity, including how much work remains as well as fully completed projects, both European and U.S. companies are at parity. But more than twice as many U.S. respondents — 13% — report no integration activity is under way, compared with 5% of European respondents indicating so (chart 1).

Similarly, nearly 48% of European poll takers say they expect the integration work in their companies to be completed in one to two years, compared with 32% of U.S. companies, nearly the same percentage as last year (chart 2). And in one of the poll's more closely watched indicators, the percentage of factory floor systems and devices connected to higher-level systems, 35% of European respondents say that more than 30% of these systems have been linked, compared with only 23% of U.S. companies, a nearly four-point drop from last year (chart 3).

But when it comes to the basic business and technology goals driving the integration activity, both U.S. and European manufacturers are on the same page. Whether it is speeding up product development, improving customer service, reducing overall technology spending, or alleviating downtime and maintenance, U.S. and European companies are in hot pursuit of the same advantages. The poll's findings are similar with regard to technology. Company-wide information sharing, a single information architecture, and a singular view of data are goals widely shared by the two groups. The industry truly lives in a global marketplace of ideas (chart 5) and (chart 6).

In close alignment, too, is the way both U.S. and European companies formulate their technology integration plans. For example, while nearly 26% of U.S. respondents indicate they will pass data from a PLC or distributed control system first to an MES and then to an ERP system, nearly 18% of European companies say they will follow this route. Similarly, 19% of U.S. companies will pass data from the control level directly to an ERP system, compared with 18% of European entities. Even more companies — 28% of U.S. companies, up substantially from 18% in last year's poll, and 24% of European organizations — will have integration take place through a separate hub (chart 4).

The challenging side of the integration work, those issues related to people, competing business priorities, and management policy, is yet another shared experience for U.S. and European manufacturers. When asked what they have found to be the most challenging aspect of integration, 52% of U.S. poll respondents placed a high level of emphasis on people and organizational issues, compared with 58% last year. About 41% of European poll takers said the same thing. Competing priorities — at 39% of U.S. poll takers, the same as last year — and budget issues — at 36%, down from 39% last year — were the two other highest areas of emphasis. Nearly an equal percentage of European and U.S. respondents cite a lack of standards as a key issue (chart 9). Half of European respondents have delayed projects due to complexity issues, while 48% of U.S. respondents have done so this year, up from 44% last year (chart 7).

Responsibility for the integration work appears nearly as diffuse in European manufacturers as in U.S. companies. Whether it is an internal IT team, a team comprised solely of automation professionals, or a combined IT/automation team, no one organizational form dominates in either U.S. or European manufacturing companies (chart 10). And when asked about the degree of influence of various personnel in driving integration in their companies, executive management, operations vice presidents, and IT departments are the most prominent, according to both polls (chart 11). Given the organizationally pervasive nature of plant floor to enterprise integration projects, it is not surprising that a number of functional groups must collaborate on them. But that need for collaboration also makes these projects tougher to manage.

And it is the management challenge associated with enterprise integration that comes through loud and clear from both sides of the Atlantic. While U.S. and European manufacturers may have differences in language, history, and even the scale of their businesses, they share many common issues when it comes to getting people to work together to create the business advantages necessary to compete in a global market. Perhaps the key finding in comparing the U.S. and European polls this year is just that: We are united in a common pursuit to transform the way manufacturing is run.