Industry

Manufacturers and Industrial Companies

The programmable logic controller (PLC) on your best line may be older than some of the people running it. It works, it is paid for, and nobody wants to touch it. Leaving it alone is reasonable until the front office needs production data the floor cannot send, or someone notices the plant network and office systems share the same network switches. Real complexity enters when we bring wireless devices on the floor and factor in third party access to proprietary automation systems.

Many manufacturers can’t afford and do not need a full-time CIO or CTO. They need a senior technologist who owns the space between the plant floor and the front office a few days a month. That is a fractional CIO or CTO. The first call settles which seat, if any, you need.

A floor-to-office check

If the line went down tonight, would you know by morning what it cost?
Can you name the person who understands how the plant technology stack was built and laid out?
Are floor machines on a separate network from office computers and mobile devices?
Do production counts reach the enterprise resource planning (ERP) system without anyone re-keying them?
When an equipment vendor connects remotely, does someone here approve the session and watch it close?

Three or more no answers, and the floor carries risk the office cannot see.

What we hear from manufacturers

"The contractor who built our plant network retired, and he took the drawings with him."

We walk the floor, document what is really there, and name an owner, so the next change is a plan. If your IT manager is retiring, we do it before he leaves. Ensuring your operational leaders understand the architecture and ensuring security controls and isolation are kept up over time.

"Our largest customer and our insurer want proof the plant is secure."

They ask how the plant is separated from the office network, what is connected, who can reach it remotely, and how fast you can recover. We close the gaps in stages around production windows and write honest answers your plant manager agrees with. You also get a recovery estimate in days and dollars, and a downtime playbook: who decides, who calls which vendor, and how the office keeps shipping and invoicing. Defense suppliers carry additional contract rules we’ll help you meet and exceed.

"We run two platform systems after acquisitions, and nobody can show margin by product."

Every reseller recommends the system it sells. Starting from your cost questions and integration challenges, we help you decide whether to keep one, replace both, or fix what you have. A proposal already on your desk gets tested against your own data first.

"The board asked about AI. Our production data lives in three spreadsheets and a whiteboard."

In our experience AI pays off first in operations and quality, where the data exists and the same decision comes up every shift. Predictive maintenance waits until sensor and maintenance data are clean. We start with what your data supports today, then weigh a platform against point tools.

How it starts

The simplest first step is a Technology Assessment: an independent read of your systems, spend, and risk against where the business is going. You get a position, not an inventory: what is fine, what is fragile, and what needs a decision this year. Then we hand back, or one senior principal holds the seat on retainer, with a bench behind them.

We sell no software, no managed services, and no remediation hours, and we take no referral fees, so no vendor interest sits behind the advice.

Make contact

Talk to a founding partner.

Send the customer's security questionnaire, the insurer's renewal questions, the ERP proposal, or what the last outage cost. A founding partner will tell you whether an Assessment, a seat, or nothing at all is the right next step.