Digital Twin Trends Report Findings: Key Benefits Exceed Expectations
A proven, transformative digital twin reshapes how organizations manage assets, optimize processes and achieve sustainability goals. Hexagon's Digital Twin Industry Report delivers insights from more than 600 C-suite executives on the value of digital twins and how the benefits far surpass initial expectations.
Let’s explore the report’s key findings, which include the return on investment (ROI) for organizations, unexpected benefits and digital twins’ role in driving sustainability.
And review our previous blogs for more digital twin insights:
Unlock Organizational Value
According to the report, 62% of leaders recognize the immense value of adopting digital twin technology. Digital twins enable organizations to visualize and simulate complex systems in real-time, leading to better decision-making, improved collaboration and enhanced efficiency.
However, the numbers also highlight a gap in how organizations measure these gains. While 46% of respondents have systems in place to track return on investment (ROI), among those that do, 92% report a return exceeding 10% and half report a return between 30% to 40%. What does this mean? Structured tracking of digital twin ROI validates their value and builds confidence in expanded investments. The most reported benefits include:
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- Improved efficiency (49%): Digital twins streamline operations to help teams to work smarter.
- Proactive problem-solving (47%): Teams with digital twin technology can predict and address issues before they occur, reducing downtime and ensuring steady operations.
- Reduced risk (46%): Digital twins can help organizations mitigate risks effectively because the technology provides a deeper understanding of potential vulnerabilities.
- Better product/service quality (45%): With enhanced visibility and insights, organizations can refine their offerings to meet and exceed customer expectations.
Surpass Expectations
Hexagon’s Digital Twin Industry Report highlights how digital twins consistently surpass expectations. Organizations that have yet to adopt digital twin technology often undervalue its potential to foster collaboration and enable proactive problem-solving compared to organizations using the technology and directly seeing the benefits. Key findings include:
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- Only 19% of non-users anticipate digital twins significantly enhancing collaboration. However, 44% of current users report experiencing notable benefits in this area – a difference of 25 percentage points.
- Similarly, while 28% of non-users expect digital twins to improve proactive problem-solving, nearly half of users (47%) confirm achieving this outcome.
Interestingly, the gap between expectations and reality remains smaller regarding more quantifiable benefits like cost savings or revenue growth. What does this suggest? Although financial benefits remain easier to predict, many organizations undervalue digital twins’ operational and collaborative advantages.
Drive Sustainability
Digital twins can also play a pivotal role in advancing toward sustainability goals. Executives surveyed identified sustainability as a major benefit of digital twins, particularly in industries where reducing carbon footprints remains a regulatory requirement and a competitive differentiator.
Digital twins can offer precise, data-driven insights into carbon emissions, energy consumption and waste reduction. Digital twins allow organizations to design, operate and optimize systems that consume fewer resources and produce fewer emissions. Forward-thinking teams can also use digital twins to simulate scenarios and evaluate how operational changes impact emissions. These tools can monitor energy consumption in real time to reveal inefficiencies and pinpoint optimization.
The Time to Act Is Now
Hexagon's Digital Twin Industry Report shows that digital twins deliver remarkable value, often going beyond expectations. These tools enhance collaboration, reduce risks, improve product quality and drive sustainability, making their benefits measurable and transformative.
For non-users, the report outlines practical steps for the integration of digital twins into operations, offering a way to achieve greater efficiency, resilience and sustainability.
Download Hexagon’s Digital Twin Industry Report today for deeper insights and learn how digital twins can revolutionize your operations. Stay tuned for the next blog in this series, where we’ll explore specific industry use cases and strategies for maximizing digital twin ROI.