Survey: Collaboration and AI Adoption Trends Manufacturers Should Know

Innovation is no longer just a product of creativity—it’s a product of alignment. Yet according to new research by Propel Software and Talker Research, most product organizations are anything but aligned.

A survey of 800 U.S. product operations professionals across industrial equipment, medical device, high tech, and consumer goods sectors reveals a sobering truth: collaboration breakdowns, driven by disconnected systems, are stalling product innovation at every stage—from design and sourcing to marketing and service.

The implications are urgent. While many companies are investing in AI to accelerate growth, few have the unified data infrastructure needed to make those investments work. 

The real blocker isn’t ambition—it’s fragmentation.

Disconnected Systems Are Undermining Product Operations

Across every industry surveyed, the most consistent theme was this: product innovation is being derailed by siloed teams and disjointed technology stacks.

Collaboration Fails Where It Matters Most

Despite the collaborative nature of product work, nearly half (49%) of respondents said their core product teams—engineering, quality, and supply chain—don’t collaborate effectively. 

The issue isn’t interpersonal. It’s architectural. The top-cited barrier? A lack of integrated systems.

The problem doesn’t stop within product functions. Another 43% say collaboration between product and commercial teams (marketing, sales, service) is equally broken, again due to fragmented technology.

When asked what better collaboration would unlock, respondents pointed to two levers of competitive advantage:

• Improved product quality
• Faster production and time to market

In other words, the failure to align isn’t just a process inefficiency—it’s a threat to your value proposition.

The Consequences: Role-Specific Friction Across the Lifecycle

The downstream effects of fragmentation differ depending on where you sit in the product value chain, but the root cause is the same.

Let’s break down three areas where these fractures are most visible:

1. Product Teams Can’t Plan or Adapt at Speed

Without visibility across functions, product managers struggle to scope new initiatives and manage change:

• 24% cited difficulty estimating development effort
• 22% flagged challenges in handling product changes

2. Customer-Facing Teams Are Left in the Dark

Marketing and sales functions are flying blind, often relying on outdated or incomplete product data:

• 40% of marketers said they lack access to accurate, up-to-date product info
• 42% of sales professionals struggle to find the right specs in time to answer customer questions
• Only 25% of service teams say they’re aware of product changes before working with customers

These are not minor inconveniences—they are moments of truth for your brand.

3. Operational Risk and Compliance Are Harder to Manage

In regulated industries, disconnected systems don’t just slow teams down—they create compliance risk:

• 34% of quality professionals said maintaining validation post-upgrade is a top challenge
• 22% struggle to manage audit trails and documentation

Can AI Succeed Without a Strong Foundation?

With pressure mounting, many companies are turning to AI for relief—and in some cases, it's working. A full 65% of respondents report using AI within product operations and seeing success, especially in areas like productivity, automation, and sourcing.

But those successes are inconsistent and often superficial.

While the high-tech industry is leading in adoption (51% actively using AI), confidence remains shaky:

• 34% fear data privacy or IP leakage
• 28% are unsure about ROI
• 27% don’t fully trust AI-generated recommendations

These doubts aren’t unfounded. Without a common data model, AI has no reliable foundation on which to act. Feeding siloed or inconsistent product data into AI systems doesn’t solve the collaboration problem—it compounds it.

From Siloed to Synchronized: A Blueprint for Success

To deliver real innovation, companies must reverse the fragmentation that’s taken hold over the past decade. That means moving from a patchwork of disconnected systems to a single, collaborative, and AI-ready platform.

Ross Meyercord, CEO of Propel Software, frames it succinctly:

“Siloed departments and disconnected software solutions are no match for today’s fast-paced market demands. With a secure data foundation and AI embedded into the core, manufacturers can scale confidently.”

The implication? Collaboration isn’t a soft skill problem—it’s a systems architecture problem.

Propel One: A Platform Purpose-Built for Alignment

This is exactly what Propel One was designed to address.

Built on Salesforce and architected as a single cloud-native solution, Propel One unifies PLM, QMS, and PIM into one collaborative product thread. It empowers teams across every role—product, quality, supply chain, marketing, and service—with:

• A common data model to ensure everyone is working from the same source of truth
• AI agents tailored to each function, streamlining repetitive work and surfacing critical insights
• Enterprise-grade security and compliance, ensuring trust across all product data operations

Rather than bolt AI onto a broken system, Propel One embeds intelligence into a unified foundation—so teams can move faster, collaborate better, and adapt in real time.

Final Takeaway: Real Innovation Starts with Real Integration

The survey results are clear: most product organizations know where they’re struggling. What they lack is a system that connects the dots between insight and action.

As AI reshapes what’s possible, the organizations that will lead are those who first solve for alignment across people, platforms, and processes.

Propel One helps solve that problem.

By consolidating product, quality, and commercial operations into a single system—and embedding AI where it can deliver real value—Propel One gives teams the clarity and context they need to work as one.

Innovation can only move as fast as your infrastructure allows. Propel One makes sure it’s no longer holding you back

Propel One is not AI hype—it’s the real deal. Take a product tour today.