Don’t Guess. Grow.

The DEVELOP Automation Assessment

From new product development to plant-wide automation upgrades, DEVELOP helps you move faster with expert Automation Assessments, CapEx justification, and a roadmap built for ROI.

Your single-source partner in automation strategy services, industrial automation consulting, and robotic systems integration.

The Problem You’re Facing

You’ve got growth goals, but no clear automation strategy.

Maybe you’re launching a new product, scaling production, or dealing with delivery bottlenecks. But leadership keeps asking:

“What’s the ROI?”
“When does it go live?”
“Who’s leading this?”

You’ve tried figuring it out yourself. Maybe even hired an automation consultant. But the plan never got off the ground.

That’s where we come in.

DEVELOP Is Your Automation Growth Partners

We’re not vendors.

We’re not the type of automation consultants who hand you a slide deck and walk away.

We’re your Chief Automation Officer, your partner in planning, justifying, and executing the right automation strategy for your business.

Whether you’re launching a new product, redesigning your facility, or rethinking how work gets done, we help you assess and scale your automation efforts with clarity, speed, and a firm eye on your ROI.

The Right Assessment, for the Right Stage

Every business is at a different point in its automation journey. Whether you’re just exploring your options or ready to make a significant investment in robotic systems integration, we have an engagement model designed to give you the clarity you need.

Start with Clarity with a Free Assessment

Before you invest a dollar, we help you get a clear picture of your automation potential. Our Free Automation Assessment Questionnaire is the first step, followed by a no-pressure, 30-minute Virtual Opportunity Discussion. It’s designed to give honest feedback on whether robotic systems integration is a smart next step for your business.

Our Tiered Automation Assessments

Once you’re ready to move forward, we offer four Automation Assessment packages. Each gives you a higher level of support, strategy, and partnership depending on where you are in your automation journey.

DIY
Tools

If you’re in early exploration mode, or just want to see how DEVELOP thinks, this free toolkit gives you instant access to our internal planning resources. These are the same frameworks we use to assess automation opportunities, calculate ROI, and prioritize projects. It’s ideal for curious builders who want to dip their toes into planning without committing to a full engagement.

Coaching
Package

For teams who want to lead the process internally but need expert support along the way, our Coaching Package gives you access to DEVELOP’s decision frameworks and direct coaching. You’ll get a remote walkthrough of your operation, guided use of our tools, and ongoing check-ins. Perfect for engineering teams or operations leaders who want to drive their own roadmap but need guidance and accountability.

Roadmap
Package

We do the heavy lifting for you. Need a turnkey plan backed by real numbers and ready for action? Our Roadmap Package includes everything in Coaching, plus a full-day, on-site deep dive. We’ll map your processes, interview your team, identify high-ROI opportunities, and deliver a complete roadmap, including automation layouts, CapEx-ready ROI models, and a proposed timeline. It’s a fast track to making confident investment decisions.

Partnership
Package

For manufacturers with complex operations, ambitious growth goals, or urgent projects, our Partnership Package embeds DEVELOP directly into your team. Acting as your fractional Chief Automation Officer, we provide hands-on leadership, coordinate vendors, manage timelines, and help you drive implementation across departments. You get everything from the Roadmap Package, plus 40+ hours per month of embedded engineering support.

DIY
Tools

If you’re in early exploration mode, or just want to see how DEVELOP thinks, this free toolkit gives you instant access to our internal planning resources. These are the same frameworks we use to assess automation opportunities, calculate ROI, and prioritize projects. It’s ideal for curious builders who want to dip their toes into planning without committing to a full engagement.

Coaching
Package

For teams who want to lead the process internally but need expert support along the way, our Coaching Package gives you access to DEVELOP’s decision frameworks and direct coaching. You’ll get a remote walkthrough of your operation, guided use of our tools, and ongoing check-ins. Perfect for engineering teams or operations leaders who want to drive their own roadmap but need guidance and accountability.

Roadmap
Package

We do the heavy lifting for you. Need a turnkey plan backed by real numbers and ready for action? Our Roadmap Package includes everything in Coaching, plus a full-day, on-site deep dive. We’ll map your processes, interview your team, identify high-ROI opportunities, and deliver a complete roadmap, including automation layouts, CapEx-ready ROI models, and a proposed timeline. It’s a fast track to making confident investment decisions.

Partnership
Package

For manufacturers with complex operations, ambitious growth goals, or urgent projects, our Partnership Package embeds DEVELOP directly into your team. Acting as your fractional Chief Automation Officer, we provide hands-on leadership, coordinate vendors, manage timelines, and help you drive implementation across departments. You get everything from the Roadmap Package, plus 40+ hours per month of embedded engineering support.

Signs You Need an Automation Assessment

When the pressure to grow is high, it’s easy to guess where to start with industrial automation. We believe in making informed decisions. If you recognize any of the following, then you need an Automation Assessment to provide clarity on your industrial automation opportunities.

  • You’re not sure what to automate or where to start
  • You need help justifying CapEx to leadership
  • You’re launching a product and want automation in place on day one
  • Your team is already overloaded
  • You’ve hit bottlenecks in throughput, quality, or delivery
  • You’ve tried automating before, but never moved past discovery
  • You’re exploring robotic process automation (RPA) but are unsure where it fits
  • You need business automation solutions that deliver ROI.

What You’ll Walk Away With

You don’t get a vague report. Our assessments are designed to give you the practical deliverables you need to move from theory to a working automation solution.

  • A clear, scoped Automation Roadmap
  • CapEx-ready ROI models for executive buy-in
  • Process maps and labor analysis to support change
  • NPD design aligned with scalable automation
  • A plan that moves past theory and into action.

Real-World Impact

Case Study: Elec-Tron (WI)

From manual assembly to 4M+ units/year.

Challenge: Scaling production without burning out staff

Solution: DEVELOP delivered an Automation Roadmap, scoped a custom system, and built the solution

Outcome: Multi-million unit throughput, high-mix capability, and scalable growth

Free Tools and Resources

Not every team is starting from the same place. These tools and services meet you where you are, whether you’re just exploring business automation solutions or actively planning your next automated manufacturing system.

Find Out if Automation’s a Fit

This quick, 2-minute survey is designed to uncover whether automation is a good fit for your operation. It’s the first step in our Automation Assessment process and helps you pinpoint high-value opportunities without a big time or budget commitment.

Plan Smarter with Our Free Guide

Our free eBook, Automate to Elevate, gives you a framework for smarter, faster decision-making. It includes templates, ROI tools, and insights we use in our own automation strategy services, so you can start shaping your plan from the inside out.

Talk to an Automation Expert

Talk directly with our team of engineers about your systems, bottlenecks, or goals. We’ll walk through your options and recommend next steps, whether that’s on-site discovery, virtual support, or ongoing automation consulting services.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Do you have questions about automation strategy services or industrial automation consulting? These FAQs answer concerns from operations teams, plant managers, and engineers about CapEx justification, RPA assessments, and scaling automated manufacturing.

An Automation Assessment identifies high-ROI opportunities to improve your throughput, reduce labor costs, or eliminate errors through automation.

It’s the foundation of any successful automation strategy. DEVELOP uses engineering-driven tools to evaluate your current processes and recommend targeted solutions before you commit capital.

Our Automation Assessment offering is a tiered system that starts with a free self-assessment and scales up based on your needs. The goal is always the same: to identify high-ROI opportunities, justify CapEx with data, and build a roadmap that actually gets used.

  • If you’re just exploring, we offer free tools and resources to help you think clearly about automation.
  • If you want expert guidance while keeping the process internal, our Coaching Package gives you frameworks and 1:1 support.
  • If you need a full plan, scoped and delivered, the Roadmap Package builds it for you, on-site, hands-on, and ROI-ready.
  • And when you’re ready to move fast or scale up, our Partnership Package embeds DEVELOP as your fractional Chief Automation Officer and engineering team.

Our Automation Partner Services refer to the long-term implementation and leadership work we do after your roadmap is in place. It includes vendor coordination, system design, engineering execution, and acting as your strategic automation lead. It’s the difference between planning a trip and hiring someone to drive the whole route with you.

Unlike generic consultants, our industrial automation consulting is built for manufacturers. We combine on-site engineering with virtual planning tools to evaluate real-world constraints, budgets, and process needs. You get clear technical recommendations, not vague strategy decks. But the real value is the foundation we build. We aim to build a long-term relationship and grow together by designing and delivering the right machines over the years, not just one, but many. It’s about establishing a high-trust partnership and setting a clear path forward for your business automation solutions. 

Yes. CapEx justification for automation is one of the most common reasons clients engage DEVELOP. We help you model potential ROI, build labor savings scenarios, and create data-backed arguments to justify investment, which are especially useful when pitching automation to executives or stakeholders.

Business automation solutions often refer to software-based tools like ERP integrations, HMIs, or RPA (robotic process automation). Factory or industrial automation typically involves physical systems that improve manufacturing processes, like conveyors, robotics, or sensors. We work with both, depending on your business goals.

We assess a wide range of automated manufacturing systems, including packaging lines, palletizing systems, robotic assembly cells, conveyor integration, and machine vision applications. Whether you’re building a new line or upgrading an existing one, our assessments are designed to identify high-ROI automation opportunities tailored to your facility.

Unlike other automation consulting services, we’re not just consultants who hand over a plan and disappear. We’re engineers and builders. We approach every project through the lens of what can actually be built and maintained on a real factory floor. This hands-on, end-to-end perspective gives you clear recommendations for everything from CapEx justification to control integration because we stay involved until the solution is up and running on your floor.

Yes. We’re Midwest automation experts with clients across Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, and beyond. As an official FANUC Authorized System Integrator (ASI), we bring trusted robotics expertise to every engagement. We also support manufacturers nationwide through both virtual assessments and on-site visits. 

With our automation engineering consulting, you get expert guidance through the entire process of robotic systems integration. We’ll work with your team to determine the best approach, identify the right robotic systems for your specific needs, and develop a comprehensive plan that avoids risk and drives a rapid return on your investment. We prioritize a data-driven approach, focusing on maximizing your ROI by delivering a robotic system that’s designed for the long haul.

Ready to partner with DEVELOP LLC and transform
your manufacturing processes?

Ready to partner with DEVELOP LLC and transform your manufacturing processes?