John Bailey (above), Executive Chairman, founded the company from his garage in 1985
OT digital solutions can deliver real business value and future proof industrial operations
This year’s Xchange conference, hosted by SolutionsPT, gathered industrial leaders to discuss how advancements in industrial IT intelligence, software, digitalisation and visibility are creating real business value. The landscape of industry is accelerating at an unprecedented pace, and this is unlocking greater levels of efficiency and traceability across a wide supply chain. Conference attendees heard from leaders in the space on the latest technology developments, real word application stories and the roadmap for the future.
In 2025 SolutionsPT turned 40 years old. Four decades on from when John Bailey, Executive Chairman, founded the company from his garage in Greater Manchester he opened its annual Xchange conference by reflecting on how a culture of collaboration and progress has impacted the ecosystem whilst looking toward a new year of innovation. John said: “we bring industrial software leader AVEVA together with system integrators to support the vision of our customers and then bring that vision to reality. The environment our partners exist within is very complex and collaboration is so important to the success of this, technology is what powers us, but mindset is just as important. One of our most longstanding customers Princes Food is leading the way, having started with just a few SCADA nodes on the plant floor, today they don’t just adopt our tools, but they adapt them to make them their own, and we have supported them along the journey.”
The latest technology
The events theme was centred around how data, AI, and connected technologies are shaping the future of industrial operations. For years industrial software providers such as AVEVA have delivered value via predictive analytics using data. Now, access to large language models (LLMs) and agentic AI means that this data can be accessed and understood across wider teams and the potential for how it can be used has taken a giant leap forward.
Charlotte Smith, Technical Manager at SolutionsPT delivered a powerful message that “If you are only using AI to create videos and write presentations then you are way behind.”
Today’s industrial businesses must urgently embrace AI at large scale in order to deliver the goals set out in the 2025 Industrial Strategy and secure their place of leadership in the global manufacturing market. Factories can now operate in complete darkness, run by robots, powered by agentic AI, and monitored by a few highly trained humans who could even be at a remote location, and this has been happening in China for at least five years.
The OT world is using AI for robotics, cyber security, virtual assistants, predictive analytics, process optimisation and vision systems. Some of these innovations are more mature than others but all of them require the storage, access and use of data. We no longer need to rely on cloud servers from other solutions providers to store this data, we can store and use this data on the edge. This ensures data will not get lost and is secure.
Longstanding partnership
For more than two decades SolutionsPT has been the key distributor of AVEVA software within the UK and Ireland. This relationship has enabled the development and deployment of the latest technology across UK markets. When developing new technology AVEVA focusses on two key principles. First, combining radical modernisation with scalable investment and second, enabling existing customers to adopt new features at their own pace. One of these technologies was unveiled during Xchange, AVEVA InTouch 2026. The evolution of the world’s most trusted SCADA and HMI platform delivers key benefits to industrial businesses including:
- Operational Efficiency: InTouch 2026 includes advanced tools for managing, analysing, organising, and acting on industrial data. Streamlined data handling improves decision-making by allowing operators to access vast information in a usable form. Python scripting expands openness through custom data processing routines in the widely adopted language.
- Security and Compliance: With two years to go until the main obligations introduced by the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) begin to apply, InTouch 2026 focusses on security by default. Features such as Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) encryption for Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) will ensure robust protection for sensitive data across a connected network.
- Modernisation for user experience: Enhanced ease of use, and fast time-to-value through improved engineering experience and automated content creation using generative AI alongside simplified transitions to Operations Control and CONNECT.
A look toward what is possible
The event closed with an address from Tim Sowell, SVP of Digital Portfolio Strategy at AVEVA.
Tim discussed the roadmap for industrial software development “Our goal is to empower the end user, across many roles to be an effective collaborative team, no matter location. To do this we are developing our platforms to become intuitive, enable ‘Industrial information literacy’, and more user friendly and proactive through AI Assistance. The latest iteration of AVEVA CONNECT allows us to use one model ‘Industrial Twin’ across all systems whilst keeping data segmented. This enables scalability and also regional or local context. By using it in conjunction with AVEVA PI and InTouch HMI (Wonderware), AVEVA System Platform, MES systems, and Engineering Information ‘Unstructured documents’, users can bring all industrial data up from the plant and run advanced analytics in real time to enable them to do things they have never done before. We continue to run updates every day to release new capabilities and services across our solutions. We do this to empower industrial teams to make informed decisions that will supercharge efficiency and sustainability”.
Looking toward Xchange 2026
The yearly event served as a benchmark for the progress being made in industrial intelligence during an era of rapid change and possibility. The tools, data and technology needed to create real, measurable impact already exist. The challenge now is to ensure that supply chains stay connected and intelligent while modernising in ways that reflect the unique needs of each operation. Collaboration between people, technologies, and ecosystems will define the next forty years of industrial progress.
