For years, when a packaging plant wanted to add a robot, it often called the company that built the surrounding machinery. That habit is starting to break.
According to PMMI's 2026 Robotics in Packaging & Processing report, 69% of end users currently rely on packaging and processing machine OEMs to integrate robotics into their production lines, making machine OEMs the most-used integration partner today by a wide margin. System integrators (40%) and internal engineering teams (36%) round out the current top three.
Over the next 12 months, end users expect that order to change. The report finds that the share planning to use packaging and processing machine OEMs for integration is set to fall by almost half—enough that machine OEMs no longer appear in the projected top three.
In their place, system integrators move to the front at 53%, followed by internal engineering teams and robotics manufacturers, tied at 42%. Robotics manufacturers are a notable addition: they don't appear in the current top three but climb into it as end users look ahead.
What's driving the shift is complexity. The report attributes the move toward system integrators to the increasing complexity of robotic deployments, which is leading more end users to seek outside integration and support. As robots take on more varied tasks and connect to more of the line, the integration challenge grows beyond what a single machine OEM's scope typically covers.
The pattern carries a clear message for suppliers. Machine OEMs that treat integration as a core competency, not a bolt-on to equipment sales, stand to defend ground that specialists are otherwise positioned to take. For system integrators and robotics manufacturers, the next year represents an opening to become the partner end users turn to first.
SOURCE: 2026 Robotics in Packaging & Processing
For more insights from PMMI's Business Intelligence team, find reports, including Robotics in Packaging & Processing, Managing Obsolescence, and The Ripple Effect: CPG Sustainability and the New OEM Spec Sheet https://www.pmmi.org/business-intelligence.
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