In the digital age, long-standing manufacturing companies must adopt new technologies to streamline their processes and stay competitive in the market. However, it can be overwhelming for leaders to know where to start or what to do next.
What is digital transformation in manufacturing?
Digital transformation, powered by tools such as the Microsoft Dynamics 365™ platform, can help manufacturing companies unify operations, improve supply chain resilience, make smarter data-driven decisions, enhance customer relationships and experiences, and optimize financial performance.
Fortunately, digital transformation doesn’t have to happen all at once. Manufacturing leaders can focus on using current technology in a specific business area, division, location, or function before implementing new technology across the entire business. This gradual approach can yield meaningful digital transformation improvements while minimizing unnecessary disruption to the business.
Regardless of where companies are in their digital transformation journey, Microsoft™ solutions can help manufacturing leaders achieve their goals.
5 ways manufacturing companies can accelerate digital transformation
Unify business systems
While manufacturing merger and acquisition (M&A) activity was stable in 2023, initial results and forecasts for 2024 indicate a growing transaction market. One disruptive result of most M&A activity is the business functioning with multiple systems and various processes across facilities. Regardless of what causes companies to operate with multiple, disparate systems, not having a unified platform can make it difficult for executives to get an accurate view of business performance, which might force them to make strategic decisions with incomplete data.
Dynamics 365 software helps unify business processes in one system. A centralized system creates greater visibility and insight into data, which helps leaders make more informed decisions. A single enterprise platform also allows for faster adoption of standardized processes across locations, business lines, and product groups.
Establish supply chain resilience
Volatility in the manufacturing supply chain remains a consistent challenge in the industry. Evolving regulatory requirements, new competitors, and changing customer demands can disrupt a company’s supply chain. Disruptions can negatively affect customer satisfaction and cause leaders to feel a lack of control over operations.
Increasing supply chain visibility and using tools to automate internal processes and facilitate external communication can help mitigate problems. Microsoft Power Platform™ software provides the tools and templates manufacturing leaders need to improve efficiency, create more transparency, and reduce the risk of disruption.
Enhance data driven decision making
Most manufacturing leaders turn to insights from their company data to make more strategic business decisions. However, executives often look at reports that simply show numbers and facts, which leaves them to interpret the data and determine what it might mean for their next steps.
Leaders who want actionable insights from their manufacturing data need analytics that provide more context. Microsoft Azure™ and Microsoft Power BI™ software can standardize data and deliver insightful analytics to help executives make confident business decisions.
Improve customer relationships
Customer needs and demands are a high priority for manufacturing companies. Meeting and exceeding customer expectations helps businesses gain a competitive advantage. But without the right tools, customer service teams risk losing important information and customer relationships.
Manufacturing companies can enhance engagement and deliver more personalized service using platforms and tools for managing customer relationships, such as Dynamics 365 Sales, Dynamics 365 Customer Insights, and Dynamics 365 Customer Service. Sales and customer service teams gain greater visibility into customer information and requests so they can provide an elevated customer experience. For manufacturing companies, streamlining the end-to-end customer experience can be the difference between breaking into a new market or missing out on the next major opportunity.
Optimize financial performance
When it comes to choosing a new technology, many business leaders fail to consider finance as a crucial function of the system they choose. However, optimized financial tools and strategies can pave the way to digital transformation for manufacturers.
Solutions such as Dynamics 365 Finance bring various enterprise financial data into one unified platform and provide robust analytics, insights, and planning features that can help teams improve financial decision-making and resilience. The platform delivers nearly real-time data into everyday financial tools such as Microsoft Excel™ and Power BI software for seamless collaboration and fast and accurate reporting. Additionally, the Dynamics 365 platform offers advanced AI, forecasting, and planning capabilities to help manufacturing businesses stay agile and to proactively detect risks and capitalize on market opportunities.
Webinar: The Future of Manufacturing Begins With Crowe + Microsoft
In this webinar recording, Crowe industry specialists explore four powerful ways manufacturing companies can accelerate digital transformation by using Dynamics 365, Power Platform, Power BI, and Microsoft Copilot AI software.
Accelerate your digital transformation in manufacturing with Crowe
Regardless of your manufacturing company’s digital transformation stage, Crowe has solutions to meet you where you are and accelerate your transformation. Our team of specialists at Crowe combines deep industry experience with technological knowledge to help companies like yours overcome challenges. We can help you determine which technology is right for your business and tailor it to meet your unique needs. Reach out today with any questions.
Microsoft, Azure, Dynamics 365, Excel, Power BI, and Power Platform are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies.
This article was originally published on Sept. 24, 2024, and was reviewed and updated.
Meet our specialist
Tony specializes in Microsoft cloud solutions (specifically Dynamics 365 and Azure) and the implementation of industry-specific technology based on these platforms. Tony has more than 13 years of experience providing enterprise software sales, operational, and IT consulting, including project management, business process design, and business process and technology implementation.
