Automation refers to the use of technology to complete tasks and processes with minimal human intervention. The term encompasses a range of technologies from robotic palletizing cells to AI product management tools. Automation is transforming industries and there are tremendous benefits to automating parts of your business.
The case for automation is getting stronger every year. Whereas 10 years ago, we were still introducing companies to the basic benefits of automating even one process, now people often come to us already knowing that they want to automate. And they want to do it quickly and efficiently.
There are many benefits to adding automation, particularly with robotics. While a lot of discussions focus on the “simple benefits” of automation — like increased efficiency, productivity, and performance — there are many more nuanced benefits to automation.
If you want your business to thrive this year, it’s important to understand the specific benefits that are most important right now. It’s also important to know what you should avoid when automating, to escape common pitfalls.
Let’s explore 9 of the top benefits of automation in 2025.
9 Benefits of Automation in 2025 (and What to Avoid)
1. Flexibility and agility
With robotic automation, we often talk about flexibility and agility. These are both benefits that come with automation but one is increasingly more relevant in 2025…
Flexible automation refers to systems that can meet planned changes to task or product demands. For example, your company might experience seasonal production spikes. A flexible automation process can adapt to these predictable changes.
As Robotiq R&D Project Manager, Nicolas Lauzier highlights, this agility and associated smart technology can give your company a competitive edge:
“There is an urgency for adopting automated solutions in the current economic climate. According to reports, smart factory solutions will be the primary drivers of competitiveness in the next five years.”
A pitfall to avoid here is investing too heavily in rigid automation solutions. These are often designed for mass production and can fall short in today’s fast-evolving markets.
2. Scale easily and adapt to change
A standout benefit of automation is scalability. Not only can the right automation help you ramp up production to meet your strategic growth goals, agile automation can also help you pivot production to address unexpected market shifts.
During the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020, we saw that many companies that succeeded in adapting to the changing world situation had invested in the right automation before the pandemic.
One strategy that can be very beneficial is to deploy “copy-paste” robotic cells. This involves deploying a particular application once and then replicating that same cell to scale production.
An example of copy-paste automation is in decentralized palletizing. This modular approach involves adding a palletizing cell to the end of each new production line. By incorporating this core end-of-line process into the line itself, you avoid needing a drastic reconfiguration of your facility every time you scale production.
A pitfall to avoid here is assuming that you know what the market will want in the future or relying too much on predictions. Instead, invest in automation that will allow you to adapt to changes quickly when they happen.
3. Scale production locally
Local production, empowered by collaborative robot automation, is increasingly considered a strategic choice for manufacturers.
For many years, offshoring production was seen as the way to scale production. However, in recent years, reshoring production has become popular. This shift is not just a trend but is becoming a necessity in the rapidly changing economic and geopolitical landscape.
By bringing production closer to home, manufacturers can experience many benefits, including reduced shipping costs, shorter lead times, and the ability to customize products for local markets.
Reshoring with robotic automation also builds resilience into a company’s operations by reducing reliance on complex global supply changes.
A pitfall to avoid with reshoring is to compare only the initial costs rather than calculating the return on investment of automation in the long term. Offshored operations often rely on low-cost labor, which can make automated solutions look more costly in the beginning. However, savings often become clear when you project into the medium to long term.
4. Make better decisions with data
Automation doesn’t just perform key tasks in your business, it also generates invaluable data. This data can feed into your wider business analytics and help you make better, more strategic choices.
In the modern world, data is vital for making good business decisions. With a robotic system, for example, you can generate data that allows you to keep optimizing your robotic deployment and improve performance.
Our eBook Analytics for Cobots highlights how collaborative robots can simplify capturing this essential data. By tracking only the right metrics, you can focus on those that directly align with your operational needs for the automated solution.
Collecting this data can also help you justify your past decisions, such as investing in automation in the first place. For example, the data you collect from a collaborative robot can help you calculate the ROI and make decisions about future automation projects.
A pitfall to avoid here is tracking unnecessary data. Only monitor and analyze data that is relevant to your needs and application.
5. Solves workforce shortages
Labor shortage is a growing challenge in modern manufacturing and is a problem we have been tracking for several years. With an aging workforce and fewer skilled workers in key jobs (such as end of line palletizing), automation is increasingly the only option for some companies.
Robotiq’s Nicholas Lauzier emphasizes the urgency of this situation in 2024, stating:
“Studies show that the labor shortage manufacturers currently face is not likely to diminish; in fact, it is expected to worsen. As people retire, younger workers increasingly opt for jobs with better working conditions and compensation, steering clear of manufacturing positions.”
Automation offers a strategic response to this issue, enabling you to maximize the potential of your existing teams. By allowing automated systems to take over the more repetitive, mundane tasks, you free up your skilled professionals for higher-value, more intellectually stimulating activities.
A pitfall to avoid is not communicating the labor shortages to teams before adding automation. When people understand why you are adding this new technology, they can more easily get on board.
6. Build safer, better workplaces
One of the most understated benefits of automation is its ability to create better workplaces. By addressing the “4 D’s of robotics” you remove the least appealing aspects of people’s jobs.
These 4 D’s refer to tasks that are dull, dangerous, dirty, or dear. They are usually jobs that lead to low morale, higher accident rates, lower job quality, and increased operational costs. By automating them, you can remove the burden on human workers and make their jobs more rewarding.
Robots often excel at the tasks that humans don’t enjoy doing. For example, a dull job might be a repetitive assembly task. When human workers do the same task for hours on end, they can become demotivated, and the task quality is reduced. But a robot will easily and consistently perform the same task for hours on end.
A pitfall to avoid here is not involving your team members in the deployment. When you involve people from the start, they often take ownership of the robotic deployment, leading to better results.
7. Cut waste and boost sustainability
Sustainability has become a central focus across many industries. As many companies look to align their operations with more sustainable practices, automation can provide a powerful tool to guide this transformation.
Robotic automation, for example, has been shown to make packaging processes more sustainable. Packaging can be a notoriously wasteful production stage, both in materials and energy usage. With the right automation solution, you can tackle this problem and contribute to improving your company’s overall sustainability.
By adding collaborative robot packaging, you can optimize your workflow and cut material use to a minimum. For example, by monitoring your robot, you can tweak and adjust the amount of material used in packaging to cut it to a minimum. This is not a one-off activity but rather a step you should revisit every so often to see how you can further reduce waste.
A pitfall to avoid at this stage is looking at your automated processes in isolation. Sometimes, you can reduce waste significantly during robotic deployment by noticing other inefficiencies in the rest of your operations.
8. Ensure consistent operations
While robotic automation is often most celebrated for improving efficiency and productivity, perhaps its most transformational benefit is consistency.
Unlike manual processes, automation is highly consistent. This is crucial in business processes as it ensures your company is reliable and maintains a high level of product quality. Adding a robot to your production workflow not only makes its specific task more consistent, it also improves the consistency of your entire production flow.
In Eli Goldratt’s seminal book “The Goal”, the author highlights how a particular robot workstation sets the work cadence for the rest of the production, helping to remove a problematic bottleneck. People working in manufacturing often talk about how the robot makes them more consistent because they want to “beat the robot” or keep up with its consistent throughput.
Lean Robotics provides a focused pathway that can help achieve this consistency in your business. The first stage, mapping your existing manual process, can often help you identify wasteful or inconsistent steps before you automate with a robot.
A pitfall to avoid here is trying to fit your automation into your process without considering the rest of your production stages.
9. Automation is easier than ever
Perhaps the biggest benefit to using automation in 2025 is how easy it is now to automate compared to how it was in the past.
When we first started helping companies to automate their processes, they still needed to put in quite a lot of work during deployment. These days, adding a robot to your production is easier than ever before.
Robotiq’s CEO Samuel Bouchard highlighted this at a Automatica trade fair, saying:
“With plug-and-play components, you still need to do a bit of the integration. Our early adopters were willing to do that. Now we’re working with people who don’t even know what a cobot is. It allows more people to adopt robots into their factories.”
With solutions like application kits you can add robotics to your process quickly and easily, helping you to achieve the results you are looking to make.
By removing dull, dangerous, dirty, and dear tasks from the hands of humans, you can use automation to make the mark you want to make on the world.
As Samuel says, this is part of our core driver at Robotiq:
“Our mission for the past 14 years has been to free human hands from repetitive tasks. This is still our mission. We see a lot of cobots, but I still think we’re at a really early stage. There is still a lot of potential.”
How will you automate in 2025?
Automation in 2025 promises a world beyond just efficiency or productivity.
From enhanced labor dynamics to sustainability, consistency, and usability, its benefits ripple across every aspect of business. However, the key to reaping these rewards lies in applying that automation thoughtfully and avoiding key pitfalls.
What will the future of automation look like in your company?
Check out our application kits to see how easily you can apply automation this year.
What benefit most speaks to your needs right now? Tell us in the comments below or join the discussion on LinkedIn or Facebook.
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