What Should Your Company Look for in a Systems Integrator?

Companies looking to transition from being in the middle of the pack to being industry leaders need an efficient systems integrator. You need someone who not only knows how to solve enterprise-level automation issues, but who also understands how to diagnose choke points and problems before they stall your company’s growth.

You need an industry 4.0 integrator. You need an integrator who is ready to create enterprise solutions that take your company into the future.

Specialize in Enterprise Solutions

The future belongs to the specialists. As enterprise-level automation and workflows become more complex, you cannot afford to work with companies who only dabble in enterprise-level work. You need to know that your integrator already understands the complicated and competing needs of an enterprise like yours.

You don’t have time to educate a partner on the business issues enterprise-level clients face. You need an integrator that is both tech-savvy and business-savvy.

The best integrator for your company specializes in enterprise solutions. They eat, drink, and breathe enterprise automation technology and business issues. Specialists are ready to hit the ground running.

When you have a heart condition, you want a cardiac specialist, not a doctor who practices family medicine. The industry leaders of the future will only be working with integrators who specialize in enterprise solutions.

Business Intelligence

An industry 4.0 integrator has the right people in the right places. They have the business intelligence personnel to solve any business problem with the right technological automation.

Today, most integrators only have business intelligence resources to deal with supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), human-machine interface (HMI), and programmable logic controller (PLC).

But, these three areas are only part of the technology stack that companies need to master to thrive in the hyper-competitive future.

The integrator who is focused on success in the future has business intelligence in the full stack of automation technologies, including:

• Machine Learning

• Cloud-Based Solutions

• Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

• Manufacturing Execution System (MES)

• SCADA

• HMI

• PLC

If you want to be an industry leader, you must work with an integrator who has subject-matter experts for every part of the automation technology stack. Integrators that only cover part of the stack can only take you part of the way to industry dominance.

Agile Project Management

The speed of innovation in automation technology is going to increase exponentially in the coming years. You cannot afford to work with an integrator that’s slow to adapt and disorganized.

Your business won’t be able to pivot to meet the competitive challenges of the future unless you are working with an integrator who has their pulse on the industry who can change directions instantly.

Any integrator that fails to use agile project management will not be able to keep your company at the bleeding-edge to automation technology.

Agile project management is the only way to be able to pivot as needed to face both unexpected obstacles and a rapidly-changing automation technology landscape.

Lean

Expertise isn’t cheap. In the future, the best and brightest will be able to command any price they want. This means that for integrators to remain profitable and effective, they must have lean operations.

Integrators with bloated sales and human resources infrastructure will not have enough cash flow to hire the best engineers. If you want to work with the best talent, you need to choose an integrator who embraces the lean business philosophy.

Running a lean business is the only way to become the best systems integrator.

Vendor Agnostic

Technology companies love strategic partnerships. But, in the next few years, many strategic partnerships that require onerous vendor agreements will become a hindrance to innovation in the deployment of enterprise solutions.

You want an integrator that can use the best tools available, not just the best tools they are contractually obligated to use.

Automation is increasing the pace of business and technological innovation. Integrators with several vendor agreements are fighting the battle for the future with one hand tied behind their back.

Is that what you want for your business?

Only systems integrators that are vendor agnostic will have access to all the tools necessary to deploy the right enterprise solution for your business.

Here at Vanguard Vision, we believe in helping our customers stay at the bleeding-edge of automation technology with our systems integration services for enterprise solutions.