Gear Up for Development: The Automation Advantage for Sustainability in Manufacturing in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

The goal of this study was to determine the impact of business process automation on the performance of manufacturing companies in Saudi Arabia through the use of a specially designed questionnaire that covered 301 senior employees of the operations, production, and information technology departments in these companies. This research focused on the use of automation in manufacturing companies and its impact on sustainability, operational performance, and institutional performance, including the impact of automation on profitability. The results reflect the status of automation in the Saudi manufacturing market. We observed a strong trend towards automation and this contributes to enhancing profitability, increasing the market share of companies, raising efficiency and productivity, and achieving sustainability. These results were obtained through regression and correlation analysis. The agreement of the survey participants with the data related to automation reflects the relative importance of automation in the Saudi market, shows the positive relationship between automation and performance development, and opens the door to further studies in other sectors or countries.