“The future of manufacturing is not about replacing people with machines. It is about giving machines the repetitive work, so people can apply what only humans possess: curiosity, judgement, ingenuity and the courage to innovate.” – MJ Martin
A Glimpse Inside the Future
Today I had the privilege of seeing two remarkable sides of Itron innovation. The first was an approximately ten-acre RF test farm containing more than 30,000 meters operating across eight separate systems. The second was an advanced manufacturing operation where robotic systems are used to build electric and gas meters.
For someone involved in the Canadian utility industry, seeing these operations firsthand puts the term “smart metering” into an entirely different perspective. We normally see the finished meter installed on a house, business or utility system. What we rarely see is the enormous engineering ecosystem behind it.
It is rather like seeing an aircraft on the runway and then being invited inside the factory, engineering laboratory and flight-test program that made reliable flight possible.
The Test Farm Before the Real World
The RF test farm was particularly fascinating because modern meters are no longer simply measuring devices. They are communications nodes operating within increasingly sophisticated networks.
That distinction matters in Canada. Utilities must operate across dense cities, sprawling suburbs, forests, mountains, agricultural regions and remote communities. Laboratory testing alone cannot reproduce every interaction occurring when thousands of radios communicate simultaneously.
Itron has considerable Canadian experience with systems operating at this scale. BC Hydro selected Itron technology for approximately two million electric meters, while NB Power selected an Itron AMI solution involving more than 350,000 Measurement Canada-approved smart meters. (Itron)
A large outdoor test environment therefore functions somewhat like a wind tunnel for RF networks. Engineers can intentionally create complexity, observe behaviour, introduce changes and identify weaknesses before those weaknesses become utility problems.
Robots Building Precision
The manufacturing tour demonstrated another dimension of innovation.
Robotics can repeatedly position components, assemble devices, test products and control manufacturing processes with extraordinary consistency. A utility meter may ultimately operate for decades, meaning tiny variations during manufacturing can become significant when multiplied across hundreds of thousands or millions of devices.
Automation therefore becomes a form of quality assurance. The robot is not simply replacing a pair of hands. It is creating repeatability.
Perhaps the most impressive observation from the tour, however, concerned the people.
We were told that employee headcount remained approximately the same after robotics and automation were introduced. Employees were retained and retrained for different roles and responsibilities.
That challenges the simplistic assumption that automation inevitably means fewer workers. Sometimes automation removes jobs. But properly implemented automation can also remove repetitive tasks while creating positions involving robotics, maintenance, programming, process control, engineering, quality assurance and data analysis.
The machine supplies consistency. The human supplies judgement.
Innovation Requires Investment
Itron’s investment numbers help explain what we witnessed. The company reported approximately US$207 million in research and development spending during 2025, equal to roughly 9 percent of revenue. Its R&D encompasses metering endpoints, sensing and control devices, communications technologies, software, data systems and Industrial Internet of Things technologies. (Itron Inc.)
That is important because innovation is not an event. It is a discipline.
A company cannot simply declare itself innovative any more than an athlete can declare himself fit. Both conditions must be continuously earned through investment, experimentation, testing and improvement.
The Human Side of Automation
For me, the lasting lesson from these tours was not simply the sophistication of the robots or the extraordinary scale of the RF test farm.
It was the relationship between technology and people.
The better question for Canadian utilities may therefore not be, “How many jobs will automation eliminate?” Instead, we should ask, “What work should machines perform, and what higher-value work can people perform as a result?”
Questions to Ponder
Should Canadian utilities evaluate automation partly on their commitment to retraining existing employees?
Should workforce development become an explicit component of major technology procurements?
And as AI begins appearing beside robotics on factory floors, can we preserve the same principle that technology should amplify human capability rather than merely reduce headcount?
What I saw at Itron suggests that these objectives do not have to compete.
The most impressive factory of the future may not be the one with the fewest people. It may be the one where technology allows every person to accomplish more.
About the Author:
Michael Martin is the Vice President of Technology with Metercor Inc., a Smart Meter, IoT, and Smart City systems integrator based in Canada. He has more than 40 years of experience in systems design for applications that use broadband networks, optical fibre, wireless, and digital communications technologies. He is a business and technology consultant. He was a senior executive consultant for 15 years with IBM, where he worked in the GBS Global Center of Competency for Energy and Utilities and the GTS Global Center of Excellence for Energy and Utilities. He is a founding partner and President of MICAN Communications and before that was President of Comlink Systems Limited and Ensat Broadcast Services, Inc., both divisions of Cygnal Technologies Corporation (CYN: TSX).
Martin served on the Board of Directors for TeraGo Inc (TGO: TSX) and on the Board of Directors for Avante Logixx Inc. (XX: TSX.V). He has served as a Member, SCC ISO-IEC JTC 1/SC-41 – Internet of Things and related technologies, ISO – International Organization for Standardization, and as a member of the NIST SP 500-325 Fog Computing Conceptual Model, National Institute of Standards and Technology. He served on the Board of Governors of the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) [now Ontario Tech University] and on the Board of Advisers of five different Colleges in Ontario – Centennial College, Humber College, George Brown College, Durham College, Ryerson Polytechnic University [now Toronto Metropolitan University]. For 16 years he served on the Board of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), Toronto Section.
He holds three master’s degrees – in business (MBA), communication (MA), and education (MEd). As well, he has three undergraduate diplomas and seven major certifications in business, computer programming, internetworking, project management, media, photography, and communication technology. He has completed over 80 next generation MOOC (Massive Open Online Courses) [aka Micro Learning] continuous education programs in a wide variety of topics, including: Economics, Python Programming, Internet of Things, Cloud, Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive systems, Blockchain, Agile, Power BI, Big Data, Design Thinking, Security, Indigenous Canada awareness, and more.
Martin is a volunteer, a photographer, a learner, a technologist, a philosophizer, and a romantic optimist.