• The Industrial Intelligence Report reflects input from over 275 senior leaders across 12 industry sectors
  • It demonstrates that organizations are seeking to construct digital ecosystems to confront higher-order business challenges, whether that is innovating faster, navigating supply volatility, or decarbonizing complex global operations.
  • Yet the findings unearth a key paradox: while 74% of leaders consider digital ecosystems a top strategic priority, only 27% report sharing data extensively with ecosystem partners

Dubai, United Arab Emirates - AVEVA, a global leader in industrial software, and the leading global business school, IMD have launched the inaugural Industrial Intelligence Report on Digital Ecosystems and the Future of Connected Industries at AVEVA World 2026 in Milan. In a fireside chat in the mainstage, AVEVA CEO, Caspar Herzberg spoke with IMD Professor Mike Wade about the findings from over 275 interviews with leaders across 12 different sectors worldwide. Encompassing both quantitative analysis and detailed interviews with experts from the Port of Rotterdam, Kwinana in Australia and many others, the report distils how organizations can harness their industrial intelligence to build, orchestrate and scale business ecosystems.

The report reveals that while 74% of leaders consider digital ecosystems a top strategic priority, only 27% report sharing data substantially or extensively with ecosystem partners. Several illustrative case studies also emphasize the gap between ambition and execution: integration complexity, legacy systems and weak governance.

What is industrial intelligence? The report defines it as organizational capability that integrates operational technology (OT), information technology (IT), and artificial intelligence (AI) to enable connected, data-driven decision-making across entire industrial ecosystems.

The power of industrial intelligence in action

Increasingly, organizations are seeking to construct digital ecosystems to confront higher-order business challenges, whether that is innovating faster, navigating supply volatility, or decarbonizing complex global operations.

Yet, as the research makes clear, the gap between digital ecosystem ambition and execution remains wide. Understanding why that gap persists, and how organizations are beginning to close it, has become a strategic imperative for success in today’s volatile operating environment. Where ecosystems are working, companies are realizing tangible value through harnessing their industrial intelligence. Yet the barriers to success remain challenging, spanning the areas of corporate strategy, governance, and technology.

Caspar Herzberg, CEO, AVEVA explained: “With this collaboration with IMD, our ambition is not merely to understand the motivations behind the move to digital ecosystems, but to define the frameworks, competencies and leadership practices that will concretely enable companies to transcend silos and build more adaptive, ecosystem‑driven operating models.”

“Governance, integration and learning matter more right now than algorithms. Ecosystems are already delivering operational value. The next phase is about converting that foundation into strategic advantage through better data sharing, coordination, clearer roles and more deliberate leadership... Industrial sectors have decades of experience collaborating out of operational necessity. What is changing is that data, AI and connected platforms are turning those collaborations into real‑time, intelligence‑driven systems.” said Michael Wade, Director of IMD Global Center for Digital and AI Transformation and Professor of Strategy and Digital, IMD.

About IMD Business School

IMD has been pioneering leadership development for nearly 80 years. Founded by business for business, we are an independent university institute with Swiss roots and global reach. Operating from Lausanne with strategic hubs in Singapore, Shenzhen, and Cape Town, IMD works with 20,000+ executives from 120+ countries annually. Our 145,000+ alumni form a powerful global network. Consistently ranked among the world’s top business schools, IMD bridges cutting-edge research with real-world application to help leaders solve problems, scale solutions, and drive impact. Real Learning for Real Impact. To learn more, visit www.imd.org.  

Follow IMD on social media for updates. Connect with us on LinkedIn, subscribe on YouTube, or follow us on  Instagram, Facebook, or X.  

About AVEVA

AVEVA is a global leader in industrial software, sparking ingenuity to drive responsible use of the world’s resources. Over 90% of leading industrial enterprises rely on AVEVA to help them deliver life’s essentials: safe, reliable energy, food, medicines, infrastructure and more. By connecting people with trusted information and AI-enriched insights, AVEVA helps them engineer capital projects more efficiently, operate better and create sustainable value, from the plant to the cloud and beyond. Through our industrial intelligence platform, CONNECT, and our trusted and secure information management applications enriched with industrial AI, AVEVA empowers businesses to drive deeper collaboration between teams and to accelerate insight across their ecosystem of suppliers, partners and customers.  

Named as one of the world’s most innovative companies, AVEVA's open solutions draw on the expertise of more than 6,000 employees, 5,000 partners and 5,700 certified developers. The company, which has operations around the globe, is headquartered in Cambridge, UK. Learn more at www.aveva.com.