The year ahead: How industrial technology will evolve in 2023

Posted: January 23, 2023

Kerry Grimes, Head of Global Partners, AVEVA, offers his expert insight on incoming digital transformation trends

Kerry, what trends will influence industrial technology channels this year?

Mobility will be a big theme in 2023. Post-pandemic, we are finding that companies are definitely working differently, and allowing employees to stay home. It's going to be possible to run plants with fewer people onsite.

Site managers and workers will be able to remotely monitor what's happening, and even have access to offsite advanced HMI (human machine interface) to control plant operations.

As a case in point, AVEVA’s Edge applications now work from nearly any device. With web publishing and runtimes for Windows and Linux, it’s possible to monitor and control richly-illustrated SCADA or HMI applications from smartphones, tablets, panel PCs and more.

In another salient trend, tough economic conditions such as regional political instabilities, inflationary spikes and FX fluctuations will continue to pose challenges for plant owners and channel partners. But, in these straitened times, organizations are set to turn to ultra-efficient processes and technology to ensure operations are optimized for cost, agility and sustainability.

In the coming years, forward-looking plants will look to invest in end-to-end flexible digital operations, and deliver value, innovation and cost-savings in a fluctuating and competitive market.

In the same vein, companies will look to purchase cost-effective software bundle subscriptions or software-as-a-service (SaaS) packages to ensure access to the latest technology as it happens, and within budget.

What will be the greatest opportunity areas for industrial technology channel partners in 2023?

Today’s economic conditions mean that successful supply chains will be powered by agile, efficient and sustainable operations. This trend opens up a growing market for subscription models which promote organizational resilience, while also enabling channel partners to transition to recurring revenue models.

This new and evolving sales model will require increased customer intimacy in the form of continuous Customer Success Management (CSM), meaning industrial channel partners will need to improve their engagement capabilities and selling motions.

The new sales model will disrupt cash flows and require investment in the short term. However, in the long term, partners and customer will see increased sustained revenue growth and increased valuation of the partner business.

Why is demand for industrial technology subscription growing at such a fast pace?

Via subscription models, such as AVEVA Flex, customers can acquire and scale over a whole range of emerging technology solutions as their business evolves over time.

This means customers can reduce their upfront investment in industrial technologies, decrease the time-to-value of deployments, and increase the total return over time by reacting more quickly to market opportunities.

Flexibility in spending and reallocation of investment is then constantly aligned to changes in a customers’ business and production environment.

What will set winning channel partners apart in 2023?

Successful partners will lead with ability to successfully match customers and commercial offers with their organizational vision.

Winning channel partners will understand that a clients’ needs will be constantly evolving over time – now and in the future. In today’s fluctuating and competitive landscape, the most successful partners will grow with their customers, anticipating and meeting their needs in a world of constantly changing innovation.

The new economy requires a fundamentally different approach to the sales cycle, and positions the partner as a collaborative member of a team that can address immediate challenges and help customers get the most from their technology deployments.

Learn more about the AVEVA Flex subscription program here.

Speak with an expert

Kerry Grimes

Global Head of Partners, AVEVA Partner Network

Kerry Grimes is the Global Head of Partners for AVEVA. Grimes leads AVEVA’s worldwide sales go-to-market strategy for all AVEVA Partners, which consists of more than 5,000 Distributors, Solution Providers, Global and Regional System Integrators, and Technology Providers selling, servicing and supporting AVEVA’s entire product portfolio. This thriving global ecosystem helps customers of all sizes discover how industrial digital transformation improves profitability and return on capital thus allowing them to excel at innovation, productivity, and delivering competitive advantage.

Grimes joined AVEVA as the company’s Channel Chief in March 2019. He has led the management of AVEVA’s global channel sales strategy and formulated the unified AVEVA Partner Network. Prior to AVEVA, Grimes was the Channel Chief at PTC. During his tenure, Channel Partner revenue more than doubled from 72M in 2013 to over 160M in 2019 while increasing the contribution of total PTC license sales from 22% to 34%. Grimes has standout status in the industry, appearing on CRN’s Channel Chief list for ten consecutive years.

Prior to PTC, Grimes was the Channel Chief for Siemens PLM Software. Under Grimes' leadership at Siemens PLM Software, partner license revenues grew from 23% to 43% of total company license revenues. Partners became a large contributor to Siemens PLM Software revenue and profit growth.

At Siemens, Grimes’ focus was on extending the company’s industry prominence by ensuring that all partners were equipped to meet customer requirements and exceed expectations. In recognition of his work with Channel Partners, Grimes was named one of the 2006 VARBusiness Top 100 Channel Executives as well as one of VARBusinesses 2007 Top 25 “Channel Executives to Watch”. Additionally, under Grimes’ leadership, the UGS, now Siemens PLM Channel Partner Program, was awarded a 5-star program rating by VARBusiness and CRN for seven consecutive years, 2007 through 2014. PTC was awarded the CRN 5 star program rating in March 2019 for the sixth consecutive time since Grimes joined PTC.

A combination of entrepreneurial spirit and corporate leadership experience enabled Grimes to achieve his success at Siemens and PTC and what attracted AVEVA to adding him to their Global Executive Sales Team. Previously, Grimes founded Rocksteady Networks, a software company that developed a platform to enable intelligent bandwidth management, security enforcement, and differentiated services on a user-specific basis at the edge of the network.

Since 1985, Grimes has held senior financial management, executive operations and executive sales positions that brought about dynamic positive change for industry leaders. At both IBM and Vignette he played a leadership role in the areas of sales, marketing, and development. He was previously a Channel Executive for the IBM Software Group, contributing significantly to this division’s unprecedented growth and Software leadership. As Vice President of Worldwide Sales Operations at Vignette, Grimes' contribution led directly to market innovation and groundbreaking results.

Grimes holds a Bachelor’s of Science degree with high honors in Marketing from Rochester Institute of Technology, and a Master’s of Business Administration from the University of Texas in Austin. Additionally, Grimes was a recipient of the UT Business School’s highest academic award, the Kozmetsky Award, for superior academic achievement.