Five Opportunities Awaiting U.S. Manufacturers Based on Insights from CADDi's New Research

The U.S. manufacturing industry is under immense pressure. Intensifying competition with China and Mexico, slowing sector growth, ongoing economic uncertainty, and other factors are creating a difficult landscape for manufacturers to navigate. 

But pressure isn’t always a negative. Market challenges can also bring opportunities for growth and transformation. 

CADDi’s American Manufacturing Pressure and Productivity Index, based on a survey of over 330 U.S. manufacturing leaders, uncovered the top pressures facing U.S.manufacturers and how  they are rethinking their strategies in response.

Here are five opportunities that stand out.

1. Address historical data gaps to boost profitability.  

Manufacturers are down on the economy. Only 11% of senior manufacturing leaders have a positive short- and medium-term economic outlook. Regardless of what happens with the economy, many manufacturers likely don’t realize that they are overlooking straightforward opportunities to cut costs, drive profitability, and help them thrive in any economic environment.  

A significant number of procurement professionals (60%) say they’ve sourced parts at higher costs than what they knew was possible because they lacked access to sufficient supplier data for effective negotiation. The same percentage of professionals say they’ve missed the opportunity to consolidate suppliers and/or secure volume discounts for the same reason. Similarly, 71% of sales professionals have quoted or sold unprofitable deals due to not having access to historical engineering and procurement data. 

Access to historical data and AI can help address these challenges: 68% of procurement professionals said if they had historical data they could better negotiate with suppliers to secure volume discounts. Thirty-six percent said AI would specifically help with finding volume discounts.‍

2. Empower your workforce. 

Manufacturers are facing a persistent talent shortage. An estimated 1.9 million manufacturing positions could go unfilled by 2033, according to a report by Deloitte and the Manufacturing Institute. Fifty-six percent of manufacturers cite skilled labor access as a top concern of theirs in 2024.  

The talent shortage puts a strain on current employees who pick up the slack. Equipping these workers to be successful in their roles will not only mitigate the direct impacts of the talent shortage but also help with engaging and retaining existing workers. Direct your attention to solving for inadequate documentation (missing part numbers, dimensions, material properties, etc.) which 73% of procurement teams cite as their biggest frustration. Most sales teams cited long quotation processes due to needing to track down relevant information (67%) for their biggest frustration. 

3. Document your institutional knowledge.

Seventy-three percent of senior manufacturing leaders are preparing to retire in the next decade and 68% of them believe at least half of their institutional knowledge will be lost forever when they do. Even though most leaders (83%) think they’ve properly documented their institutional knowledge and are confident the next generation is prepared to take the reins, critical limitations still exist. 

Seventy-four percent of manufacturing professionals say they have a searchable database of engineering drawings and relevant parts and supply chain data, but 54% say they can only search by part ID and part name. There is a lot more historical information teams need to effectively design, procure, sell, and collaborate. Make sure that documented knowledge includes historical data by material, surface, treatment, and other metadata and that it can be easily searched and accessed by your team in the moment it’s needed. Your team will be able to keep operations running smoothly and work faster, smarter, and more confidently, long after colleagues retire.

4. Confidently onshore manufacturing.

Fifty-one percent of manufacturing leaders cite navigating political demands to bring production onshore as a top pressure point. This is likely because making the decision to bring manufacturing back to the U.S. often means absorbing higher labor costs. 

But manufacturers no longer have to make this difficult decision. They can create new levels of labor productivity by driving efficiencies in how procurement, engineering, and sales teams access and use historical and critical data. This can offset higher U.S. labor costs, ultimately supporting onshoring efforts and contributing to American prosperity. 

5. Speed time to market.

As manufacturers look to 2025, 23% see increasing speed to market as a top priority. In manufacturing’s fast-paced environment, getting innovative, high-quality products to market quickly is absolutely essential for maintaining a competitive edge. 

Despite this, 77% of procurement professionals report that, every few projects, they have to find new parts or suppliers because the initial options don’t meet engineering specifications, which is a huge hindrance to their organization’s speed to market. 

A huge benefit of solving the internal data challenge: smoother interdepartmental collaboration and faster speed to market. Fifty-five percent of procurement professionals say if they had access to historical data, they could collaborate with engineering earlier and more effectively, leading to better and faster product development. 

From Pressure to Opportunity 

While the pressures on U.S. manufacturers are undeniable, they also present an opportunity for organizations to redefine their operational strategies and become stronger.

Download CADDi’s American Manufacturing Pressure and Productivity Index to dive deeper into the pressures facing manufacturers today and turn these challenges into opportunities.

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