Podcast Summary: CIO Leadership Live – Rockwell Automation CDIO on IT, AI, and Manufacturing Resilience

Podcast: CIO Leadership Live
Host: Lucas Marion (A), Senior Writer, Computer World
Guest: Christopher Nardecchia (B), SVP, Chief Digital & Information Officer, Rockwell Automation
Date: February 4, 2026
Location: CIO 100 Symposium & Awards Show, Scottsdale, Arizona

Main Theme

This episode explores how Rockwell Automation’s IT and digital teams drive transformation, resilience, and innovation in industrial manufacturing through cybersecurity, AI, and smart manufacturing strategies. Christopher Nardecchia discusses the evolving role of IT, the move toward autonomous operations, and the cultural changes underpinning digital transformation.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Balancing Dual Roles: IT Leadership and Digital Transformation

• Overlapping Responsibilities:

  • Nardecchia describes his dual role: transforming both the company and the IT organization to support strategic growth.
  • The focus is on integrating IT directly into company strategy, not just enabling it.

    “When you integrate yourself or your organization into the strategy, then inherently you're kind of improving your own IT operations.” (01:25)

• Vision Drives the Approach:

  "Vision comes first." – Lucas Marion (02:04)
  "Yeah, absolutely." – Christopher Nardecchia (02:06)

2. Cybersecurity Risks Unique to Manufacturing

• Availability over Integrity:

  • In manufacturing, system availability is paramount; downtime can have catastrophic consequences, from wasted multimillion-dollar batches to safety incidents.

    “In manufacturing, it's mission critical. And...you're really running four or five nines all the time in manufacturing.” (02:45)

• Nation State Threats & Critical Infrastructure:

  • Rockwell supports industries like water, energy, and defense—prime targets for sophisticated attacks.

    "We support critical infrastructure. So we're worried about that not only for ourselves, but for our customers..." (05:11)

3. Building Cyber Resilience in Industrial Environments

• Strategies Employed:

  • Redundancy across controls, power, and networking eliminates single points of failure with automatic failovers.
  • Emphasis on disaster recovery, rigorous backups, and routine recovery testing.

    “Don’t make things easy, but...expect that if you had a nation-state attacking you, they're probably going to get in. So now you gotta really focus on, can you recover quickly?” (03:36)

• Tiered Recovery & Immutable Backups:

  • Rockwell identifies “Tier Zero/One” critical assets and ensures these can be restored from unalterable backups.

    "Having immutable backups, things that couldn’t be...violated or adulterated." (04:46)

4. AI, Machine Learning & Predictive Analytics in Operations

• Factory AI in Action:

  • Rockwell’s award-winning factory in Singapore leverages AI for production line optimization, employee onboarding, and process guidance.

    “AI is...embedded in every part of our kind of strategy...I think one of the most, you know, interesting use cases...is our factory AI solution in...Singapore.” (05:50)

• Accelerated Employee Training:

  • AI, AR, and VR dramatically reduce onboarding time for assembly workers from six months to a few weeks.

    "We've been able to bring that down to...maybe a month and a half by using AI assistance." (06:55)

5. Driving Cultural Change: IT as a Strategic Partner

• Shifting Mindsets:

  • Nardecchia’s proudest change is repositioning IT from a “back office” function to a central force in business strategy.

    “IT is the business of Rockwell, and the business of Rockwell is IT.” (08:01)

• Connected Enterprise Vision:

  • Integrating IT (business systems) and OT (factory systems) underpins both products for customers and internal operations.

6. Evolving for Customer Value: Subscription Models & Internal Innovation

• Product & Service Transformation:
  • Rockwell shifted from hardware-centric sales (<1% recurring revenue) to over 10% recurring due to new software and subscription models.
  • Internal IT now develops and showcases solutions—often AI-enabled—that become proof points and products for customers.

    “We become the first and best customer...drinking our own champagne, eating our own dog food in the company.” (10:50)

7. Smart Manufacturing & Industry 4.0

• Maturity Model:

  • Rockwell guides clients from enhanced operations (Level 1) to fully autonomous factories (Level 5), a reality today mainly in semiconductors but a goal for all industries.

    “It's the convergence of several technologies...physical AI up with causal AI and agentic AI.” (12:19)

• Self-Driving Factory Ambition:

  • The future is "self-driving" factories, with AI coordinating robots and processes end-to-end.

8. Skills for the Future: AI, Data, and Beyond

• Evolving Talent Requirements:

  • Demand has shifted from general software/cloud skills to deep AI/agency capabilities, data science, digital twins, and causal/physical AI.

    "Hiring people that have first off literacy in AI, but then can build up...fluency." (13:49)

• AI Literacy for All:

  • Not just for IT—AI capabilities are increasingly needed across all business functions and product teams.

• Physical AI Defined:

  "Having agents tell that physical device, a robot, what to do and then the robot...autonomously navigate...bring goods to the line..." (15:19)

9. Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Resilience and Recovery

“Expect that if you had a nation-state attacking you, they're probably going to get in. So now you gotta really focus on, can you recover quickly?”
— Christopher Nardecchia, (03:36)

On AI’s Value in Manufacturing

“It would typically take us maybe six months to onboard someone in our assembly lines...We've been able to bring that down to...several weeks...by using AI assistance.”
— Christopher Nardecchia, (06:55)

On IT’s Strategic Role

“IT is the business of Rockwell and the business of Rockwell is IT.”
— Christopher Nardecchia, (08:01)

Favorite Tech & GPT-5

“My favorite pastime is looking at all the new technology that comes out every week...GPT-5 just got released...what other tools am I, you know, deprecating?”
— Christopher Nardecchia, (16:00)

“I'm pretty bullish on the capabilities continuing to improve. But you gotta follow some...good practices to get the best out of it.”
— Christopher Nardecchia, (17:23)

Memorable Segment Timestamps

• Dual Role & Strategy Integration – 00:31–02:07
• Cybersecurity in Manufacturing – 02:07–03:21
• Building Resilience – 03:36–05:05
• Nation-state Threats – 05:05–05:39
• AI in Operations/Onboarding – 05:50–07:45
• Cultural Change & IT’s Role – 08:01–09:12
• Internal Innovation & Showcase – 09:25–11:46
• Smart Manufacturing & Industry 4.0 – 12:04–13:37
• In-demand Skills & Physical AI – 13:49–15:44
• Favorite Tech Question & GPT-5 – 16:00–17:36

Tone & Language

The conversation is candid, practical, and solution-focused, reflecting both the scale of the manufacturing challenge and excitement around emerging technology. Nardecchia balances strategic perspective with operational detail, emphasizing resilience, innovation, and integrating IT deeply with business strategy.

For listeners seeking a sharp, real-world discussion on digital transformation, AI, and manufacturing IT leadership, this episode is an insightful resource.