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Prediction

Everything plugs into everything else" (the connected factory)

A 2011 future call revisited in Jim Carroll's 2026 Manufacturing Trends Scorecard.

Everything plugs into everything else" (the connected factory)
trends-scorecardreceiptmanufacturingoriginal-year-2011
Publish Date2026-09-18
Updated Date2026-09-18
Outcomehit

The original call

Original year: 2011

2026 assessment

Scorecard verdict: Hit

I called it “the definitive trend for the next decade.” The world later gave it a name — Industry 4.0, the Industrial Internet of Things — and built it. Location, status, and an address for every device is now the baseline architecture of a modern plant. Right call, right timeline.

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Related ideas, trends and context

IndustriesManufacturing & IndustrialManufacturing is becoming an intelligent, adaptive system in which software, robotics, materials science and data increasingly define physical production.DomainsRobotics & ManufacturingRobotics, automation, digital manufacturing and new production systems that connect software intelligence to the physical world.DomainsComputing & DataThe computing, data and digital infrastructure that makes new forms of intelligence, simulation and automation possible.DomainsAdvanced MaterialsNew materials, nanotechnology and engineered substances that make products lighter, stronger, smarter and more adaptive.DomainsAI & Machine IntelligenceArtificial intelligence, machine learning, generative systems and autonomous agents that increasingly perform cognitive work.ScorecardsThe Trends Scorecard: Manufacturing - What I Predicted, and What Actually Happened7 future calls revisited for Manufacturing, including 4 hits, 1 partials, 2 early calls and 0 misses.

From Jim's archive

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ARTICLE · Mon Jun 22The Trends Scorecard: Manufacturing - What I Predicted, and What Actually Happened