Schneider Electric Launches Industrial Automation Service Built on HPE Infrastructure
Schneider Electric announced its new offering designed to help industrial organizations modernize automation environments without disrupting production, aiming to provide a foundation for software-defined automation.
The offering, Industrial Automation Modernization as a Service, combines Schneider’s Electric's EcoStruxure Automation Expert (EAE), services, and lifecycle expertise with HPE SimpliVity hybrid-cloud infrastructure and software to establish the foundation.
The service enables industrial organizations to modernize incrementally, preserve existing investments and adopt software-defined automation at their own pace, according to the company. The technology is being showcased this week at Automate 2026 in Chicago.
According to Schneider, the service has key benefits for operators including:
- Infrastructure foundation: HPE compute, storage, and data-protection technologies that provide the secure, resilient platform for mission-critical industrial workloads.
- Software and control as a service: open, software-defined automation that can be deployed, updated and governed centrally, across any compatible hardware, without touching physical assets.
- People and lifecycle services: expert services spanning assessment, migration, managed operations, cybersecurity and optimization.
Therefore, organizations can modernize incrementally alongside existing PLC and DCS infrastructure, the company claimed, adding that measurable business outcomes include:
- CapEx → OpEx: Convert unpredictable capital expenditure into stable, consumption-based OpEx.
- Scale without scaling headcount: Standardize automation across every site from a single platform.
- Faster time to value: Get to market 50% faster and cut commissioning time by up to 60% through templated, repeatable deployments that new facilities inherit rather than re-engineer.
- Security and energy performance together: Unified cloud governance enforces consistent OT cybersecurity policy across all sites, while AI-driven optimization has demonstrated up to 40% energy reduction in intensive operations.
- Incremental adoption alongside existing PLC and DCS systems.
