With RS, the future of discrete manufacturing is now

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Aug 06, 2025, 11:12 ET

Whether your business is early in its digital transformation strategy or looking for ways to scale, RS has the products, services, experience, and expertise to ensure the successful selection and deployment of smart solutions tailored to your specific needs.

FORT WORTH, Texas, Aug. 6, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- RS, a high-service global product and service solutions provider for industrial customers, offers an extensive selection of smart solutions that savvy organizations are using to digitalize and revolutionize the discrete manufacturing industry, including industrial data communications devices, motor controls, PLCs and HMIs, and sensors.

According to Eaton, 99% of discrete manufacturers were already at least beginning to engage in digital transformation in 2023. These efforts have only accelerated since, fueled by advanced technologies ranging from AI, IIoT, and cloud and edge computing devices to smart sensors, PLCs, and motor controls. Collectively, these smart solutions generate and analyze data that provides discrete manufacturers with insightful, real-time insights into their operations, improves their planning and decision-making processes, and helps them solve complex, evolving challenges related to inventory management, energy optimization, supply chain issues, aging equipment, labor shortages, and security concerns.

Overcoming interoperability challenges

Integrating these various technologies into automated discrete manufacturing operations requires increased flexibility for the machine controls used to adjust the movement, speed, or sequence of system components to improve precision, efficiency, quality, and safety. Selecting smart devices that utilize open-source hardware, software, or communications standards (like OPC UA, Modbus TCP, IO-Link, and DNP3) can be a game-changer, providing users with an even greater range of functionality, including the ability to quickly and easily swap components out — and avoid downtime — in the event of limited replacement part availability.

Many of the latest and greatest industrial data communication devices are built with modularity and flexibility in mind to make it easier and more cost effective for users like discrete manufacturers to grow and expand their system capabilities as the needs arise. For example, Ethernet switches that offer multiple ports allow operators to customize them to their specific needs. Additionally, many can support different communication protocols and networking speeds.

Banner Engineering's Asset Monitoring Gateways (AMGs) with SNAP ID, for instance, are designed to help manufactures think big, start small, and scale fast. Designed to collect and analyze data from up to 20 connected discrete, analog, and IO-Link sensors, Banner's AMGs with SNAP ID help users make important decisions that can help increase productivity, save energy, and prevent unexpected maintenance issues. They also feature a user-friendly, no-code setup and are preconfigured to automatically recognize a wide variety of compatible wired sensors right out of the box, allowing users to get up and running in minutes versus months.

Banner also offers AMGs with CLOUD ID. These rugged, IP67 industrial data communications devices make it easy to add wireless condition monitoring capabilities to equipment located anywhere in or around an industrial facility, and — just like the AMGs with SNAP ID — are designed to get users up and running fast.

Overcoming legacy equipment challenges

As digitalization accelerates, even relatively new manufacturing equipment can rapidly become outdated. To stay competitive, discrete manufacturers must invest in flexible and scalable IT and OT infrastructure, including open-source systems and modular components like manufacturing execution systems (MES), which can simplify quality control, traceability, and compliance, and edge computing systems, which can processes data near the source, handle varied inputs, and act as a communication bridge to integrate both old and new equipment.

The Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 controller, for example, features a modular, fully scalable design that's engineered to help users implement today's advanced digitalization technologies, like edge computing and AI, while simultaneously providing them with a clear path for continued digital transformation. Its central processing units execute user programs, network the controller with other automation components, and improve productivity and efficiency, and its peripheral modules form the interface between the controller and the process to support scalability, performance, and usability.

Overcoming labor challenges

As the discrete manufacturing industry continues to evolve, so does its workforce. Many professionals bring valuable expertise in modern technologies and high-level programming languages, such as C/C++ and Python. However, the diversity of platforms and systems used across the industry can present challenges in aligning these skills with specific operational needs. At the same time, manufacturers continue to face skilled labor shortages, making it even more important to bridge gaps between existing capabilities and emerging demands.

One way to help overcome this challenge is to utilize products designed to enable quick, easy, and intuitive installation and low-code or no-code plug-and-play commissioning in new and existing industrial systems, like Banner Engineering's Asset Monitoring Gateways, Red Lion Control's N-Tron NT24k Gigabit managed Industrial Ethernet switches, and RS PRO's SW-615RS five-port Gigabit-hardened Ethernet switch.

These types of devices can also be combined to create an all-in-one solution that further reduces or eliminates manual labor requirements. For example, asset monitoring gateways compatible with IO-Link sensors, like Banner's, are multipurpose solutions that enable businesses to access useful data quickly and easily while connecting components through other communication technologies, like Narrowband-Internet of Things (NB-IoT) for low-power, wide-area (LPWA) applications.

These IIoT solutions provide real-time performance data, eliminate the need to manually monitor machinery, reduce the impact of skilled labor shortages, and free employees up for higher-level tasks. They also help manufacturers avoid unplanned downtime and subsequent supply chain disruptions by identifying urgent and impending maintenance needs, optimizing maintenance schedules to minimize disruptions, and even troubleshooting issues proactively.

Other solutions that can help discrete manufacturers overcome skilled labor shortages include digital interfaces, like HMIs, which make equipment easier to use across skill levels with intuitive displays and controls, and automation solutions capable of handling repetitive tasks to free skilled workers up for more complex tasks. For example, AI can power tasks when paired with PLCs programmed to respond to inputs from devices like sensors, and smart motor control solutions can further enhance efficiency by monitoring and optimizing machine performance.

The TeSys island digital load management system from Schneider Electric is one such solution. It consists of a set of devices — including couplers, analog and digital I/O modules, voltage and power interface modules, standard motor starters, and SIL motor starters — that are installed on a single DIN rail, connected with a ribbon cable, seen as a single node on users' networks, and engineered to improve the installation, availability, safety, operation, and service life of electrical controls in a wide variety of automation architectures, primarily via the direct control and management of low-voltage loads.

This modular, multifunctional, plug-and-play system also empowers users to remotely monitor and control motors and other loads through a secure digital platform, which can help reduce the impact of labor shortages and minimize on-site staff deployments, as well as enable users to employ predictive maintenance strategies that can help prevent unplanned downtime, optimize the scheduling of planned downtime, troubleshoot issues quickly and accurately, and improve equipment uptime, efficiency, and lifespans.

Overcoming safety and security challenges

Cybersecurity is a concern for all industries, including discrete manufacturing. While IIoT devices offer valuable real-time data and insights, their internet connectivity introduces cybersecurity risks — especially when using open-source software. To mitigate these risks, manufacturers must build security into every layer of their automation systems, using smart devices with features like firewalls and VPNs.

Physical safety is also critical. Connected devices with condition monitoring and automation capabilities, like PLCs, sensors, and smart motor controls, can help detect and address equipment issues in real time, ensuring safety while simultaneously improving efficiency, quality, and sustainability.

Traceability is another key concern for discrete manufacturers — especially in industries like aerospace, automotive, and medical electronics — as it ensures transparency, supports recalls, protects against counterfeits, and helps meet regulatory standards. Durable industrial barcodes and readers are essential tools for enabling traceability in harsh manufacturing environments.

Omron Automation offers a number of traceability solutions engineered for exactly this. Its MicroHAWK barcode reader family, for instance, features ruggedized and extremely compact IP67 form factors equipped with the smallest, highest-performing imaging engine in its class and optimized for flexibility and usability. These devices can be used as both barcode readers and visual inspection systems. As such, they're widely used for regulatory compliance, process automation, quality assurance, inventory optimization, and serialization in applications extending throughout the discrete and process manufacturing industries, ranging from the automotive, consumer electronics, and industrial equipment segments to the food, beverage, and pharmaceutical manufacturing segments.

Tackle your digital transformation strategy with the right technology partner

Whether your business is early in its digital transformation strategy or looking for ways to scale and improve an already established system, it can be a complex and multifaceted process.

While discrete manufacturers face many common, industry-wide challenges — ranging from supply chain disruptions and legacy equipment to skilled labor shortages and safety and security — and even utilize many of the same core technologies used to surmount these issues in other industrial market segments, the successful selection and deployment of these technologies is often tailored to unique operating environments and application demands. Navigating these intricacies can be its own challenge, but it's not insurmountable — especially with the right resources and technology partners.

To learn more about Industry 4.0 digitalization technologies and the RS portfolio of discrete manufacturing solutions, including industrial data communications devices, motor controls, PLCs and HMIs, and sensors, ranging from IO-Link sensors to barcode readers, check out "Overcoming discrete manufacturing challenges with digitalization" by Samantha Massingill, Application Engineer – RS Technical Solutions Center, and visit the links embedded throughout this article. To begin or enhance your digital transformation and integration process, please contact your local RS representative at 1.866.433.5722 or reach out to our technical product support team.

About RS
RS is a high-service global product and service solutions provider for industrial customers, enabling them to operate efficiently and sustainably.

We operate in 36 markets, stock over 830,000 industrial and specialist products, and list an additional five million relevant for our industrial customers, sourced from over 2,500 suppliers. This extensive range supports our customers across the industrial lifecycle of designing, building, and maintaining equipment and operations. We enhance their experience through a tailored service model, leveraging our efficient physical, digital, and process infrastructure sustainably. We combine a technically led and digitally enabled approach with an exceptional team of experts; ultimately, it's our people that make the difference.

Our purpose, making amazing happen for a better world, reflects our focus on delivering results for people, planet, and profit.

RS Group plc is listed on the London Stock Exchange with stock ticker RS1 and in the year ended 31 March 2025 reported revenue of £2,904 million.

For more information, please visit https://www.rsgroup.com/ or connect with us on LinkedIn or X (Twitter).

About RS in the Americas
In the Americas region, RS stocks more than 250,000 industrial and electronic products from more than 700 trusted suppliers. These solutions cover categories extending from automation and control equipment to interconnect, passive, active, and electromechanical components and include more than 90,000 high-quality, competitively priced RS PRO products. For more information, please visit https://us.rs-online.com or connect with us via social media on Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube.