From Automation Islands To Connected Plants: A Practical Path For Life Sciences Manufacturers

By Todd Walden and Bruce Greenwald, Emerson

Years of digital investment left many life sciences plants with islands of automation: data scattered across systems, formats, and teams, with critical context lost along the way. Emerson's Bruce Greenwald argues that plants without connectivity will struggle to compete, since electronic batch records and review by exception both depend on it. Skid integration is only the start, he says; a top-down approach has to reach the whole plant. One biopharma manufacturer is already integrating MES and DCS that way, and a surprising number of equipment vendors are moving skids onto native control systems. Greenwald also sets out where teams should begin, and why tech transfer gets easier along the pipeline. Read Greenwald's argument in full.