Revenue from digital twins, or the virtual representation of a connected physical product, process or service, is projected to reach $13 billion by 2023.
Juniper Research said this is up from the $9.8 billion in 2019 or an average annual growth of 35%.
The research firm attributes the increase to the rise in deployments of advanced sensors to capture data and technological advances such as machine learning, AI, and high-performance computing.
It said manufacturing accounts for the lion’s share of the increase in revenue for digital twin initiatives at $3.3 billion. It is also the fastest growing sector and will account for over 34% of total digital twins revenue in 2023.
Two other sectors leading growth in net incremental revenues over the forecast period are: transportation (estimated revenue increase: $2.5 billion), and energy and utilities (estimated revenue increase: $1.1 billion).
Among the top companies that have boosted their digital twin offerings are General Electric, Siemens, IBM, PTC, Microsoft, and Bosch.
According to Juniper, these leading players combine in-house Industrial internet of things (IoT) expertise, strong market reach, and close collaborations with technology companies.
The research firm expects digital twins to enable staff to deliver human aspects of operations effectively.
“The new research found that advanced digital twin operations will help human workers to focus on maximizing productivity in areas that the technology cannot address, such as customer service,” it said.