Transforming customer experiences
Batch-of-one manufacturing is a key trend across almost every sector today.

• Automotive: Manufacturers offer extensive customization options—with a choice of interior finishes, infotainment systems and batteries for range and performance.
• Consumer goods: Apparel,footwear,and electronics firms enable you to select colorways and even inscribe messages on your goods. 
• Life sciences: Personalized medicine and gene therapies are now coming of age.
• Furniture: Can be customized to match an individual’s home interior and tastes.
• Food and beverage: Tailored meal kits provide optimal nutrition to suit any dietary requirements.
• Industrial equipment: Specialized machinery can be built for any environment.

This creates complexity.As a result,manufacturers are exploring the power of near real-time data,AI agents and closed loop automation to enable better decision-making and accelerated action across integrated manufacturing and supplier value chains. At Hannover Messe 2025, we’re showcasing how Microsoft and its partner ecosystem come together to make this vision a reality.

Generative design and engineering
Over the last year,we’ve seen AI evolve to become a true design partner,challenging conventional thinking and accelerating the time-to-market for new products. Manufacturers can discover better product configurations that are easier to manufacture and maintain with AI-driven design. A digital thread ensures all stakeholders have up-to-date product data,reducing errors,waste and costs across each supply chain and production step.

A digital thread can be created by unifying, contextualizing and democratizing data locked within siloed Product Lifecycle Management (PLM),Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES). This provides the rich source of timely intelligence that multi-agentic AI systems can leverage.

Enhanced customer service 
Increasingly,customers can configure products using online tools. AI agents can help order processing teams analyze market trends and customer preferences to offer dynamic pricing,ensuring competitive and profitable pricing strategies.

Optimized production planning 
Next-generation digital twins and an AI agent simulate manufacturing scenarios to determine the best plant to fulfill the order,depending on its current capacity and proximity to the customer. A production planner can talk to their data using Microsoft Copilot,querying multiple variables to make the best decisions.

Dynamic sourcing and warehousing 
AI agents can help supply chain managers make better sourcing decisions, balancing cost, carbon footprint, and lead time considerations. Beyond this, they can assist procurement teams with the difficult task of anticipating and mitigating supply chain disruptions.

Meanwhile, on the factory floor, AGVs (Autonomous Guided Vehicles) robots and, in the near future, humanoids can reduce manual labor and enhance factory intralogistics. They can be used together with Real-Time Location Services (RTLS) and digital twins to track the location and condition of finished goods and tools. This helps to reduce stock-outs of key components and raw materials and improve tool utilization and availability.

Enhanced factory operations 
A cloud-based Manufacturing Execution System (MES) provides a real-time, centralized view of the production floor. With closed loop automation, it also adapts the pace of machinery to work at the same pace as individual humans on each production line, which varies when people are fatigued, to minimize errors and waste and maximize yields. It helps firms adapt to varying production volumes—from single-item orders to larger batches—without compromising efficiency.

Human Machine Interfaces (HMIs) deliver precise digital work instructions, helping workers to optimize quality levels and yields. At the same time, manufacturers can use AI vision to synchronize machines and people,inspect products in real-time to reduce waste and ensure high-quality standards.

Better plant performance 
Shopfloor connectivity enables seamless communication between machines, systems,and operators. AI agents can help troubleshoot problems with quality issues on the factory line which could be caused by defective components or raw materials from suppliers,machinery that needs servicing or human error.

AI agents can even help with production line changeovers, the periods when machinery is reconfigured to switch from manufacturing one product to another. With computer vision, AI agents can watch the footage of production line operations like sports analysts breaking down a game to find opportunities they hadn’t noticed before,such as adjustments to tool placements or operator schedules.

Streamlined logistics 
In the next step in the process,AI agents linked to a manufacturer’s CRM system can help busy customer fulfillment agents confirm order details and prepare invoices and shipping labels. AI vision recognizes vehicle number plates,preparing orders for logistics carriers. Meanwhile,Real-Time Location Services (RTLS) monitor the truck’s journey,providing customer updates.

Enhanced field services 
The value of AI doesn’t stop there. It plays a role in helping engineering teams to remotely monitor and benchmark diagnostic data from industrial machinery—such as cranes—or consumer products—like water and heating systems. This is critical to enhance maintenance services and boost uptime. In the next step in the product lifecycle,AI agents can help the field services team quickly identify issues and optimize maintenance schedules,reducing downtime and operational costs.