Manufacturing case study

Operational continuity and OT resilience for a multinational industrial manufacturer

Manufacturing and industrial production organisations operate in environments where disruption has immediate physical and financial impact. Downtime is measured not only in lost revenue, but in supply interruption, safety exposure, contractual breach, and cascading dependency across customer ecosystems.

Resilience Guard GmbH was engaged by a major multinational industrial manufacturer with production sites across Europe and international markets. The organisation required strengthened operational resilience across plant environments, improved recovery governance for production critical functions, and integration of OT disruption preparedness into enterprise continuity capability.

This engagement focused on plant level continuity execution, industrial cyber physical disruption readiness, and measurable resilience uplift aligned with ISO 22301 principles and essential sector resilience expectations.

Business context: Manufacturing resilience is production survival
Industrial manufacturers face disruption risk shaped by:

• dependency on continuous production availability
• increasing cyber exposure across OT and control environments
• supply chain fragility affecting raw materials and component flows
• safety critical operational constraints during disruption
• rising resilience expectations under frameworks such as NIS2 for essential and high impact sectors

Unlike service industries, manufacturing disruption is immediately physical. Restart sequencing, safety constraints, and equipment integrity define recovery capability.

Executive leadership required confidence that production could be stabilised under scenarios such as:
• cyber disruption impacting industrial control systems
• loss of critical utilities or infrastructure access
• supplier interruption affecting production lines
• safety events requiring controlled shutdown and restart
• multi plant disruption affecting contractual delivery continuity

The core question was:

How can industrial production continuity be strengthened across sites, with recovery capability grounded in operational plant reality?

The situation: Plant recovery capability inconsistent across sites
The manufacturer operated multiple production facilities with varying maturity and operational cultures.
Key challenges identified included:

• inconsistent recovery objectives between plants
• limited clarity on restart sequencing for critical production assets
• OT disruption exposure not formally integrated into continuity governance
• supplier dependency impact not consistently measured at plant level
• absence of unified maturity measurement across industrial operations

The organisation required continuity designed around manufacturing execution, not office based BCM documentation.

Resilience Guard delivery focus: Continuity built around plant recovery and operational sequencing
Resilience Guard structured the engagement around industrial continuity outcomes, ensuring recovery capability could function under real production disruption conditions.
The work was delivered through four manufacturing specific resilience pillars.

1. Production critical function prioritisation and restart sequencing
Resilience Guard worked directly with plant leadership to identify which production capabilities must be restored first under disruption.

Focus areas included:

• safety critical process operations
• high value production lines with systemic customer dependency
• equipment requiring controlled restart conditions
• quality assurance functions supporting regulated output
• logistics and outbound distribution continuity for contractual delivery

Outputs included:

• tiered production criticality classification
• restart sequencing frameworks grounded in plant engineering constraints
• executive visibility into production survival priorities
This ensured recovery planning reflected operational and safety reality.

2. Business impact analysis aligned with ISO 22301 for industrial environments
A structured ISO 22301 aligned BIA was conducted across manufacturing operations.

The analysis defined:

• recovery time objectives for critical production assets
• recovery point objectives for production scheduling and ERP environments
• minimum staffing and engineering resources required during disruption
• maximum tolerable downtime thresholds linked to contractual exposure

This provided measurable continuity governance across multinational plants.

3. OT disruption preparedness and cyber physical resilience integration
Manufacturing continuity increasingly depends on OT resilience.

Resilience Guard supported preparedness for disruption scenarios such as:

• ransomware affecting production scheduling environments
• compromise of industrial control systems impacting safe operation
• loss of plant monitoring and safety automation
• cascading disruption between IT and operational environments

Key outcomes included:

• OT disruption treated as a continuity event, not only a cyber incident
• recovery governance integrated between engineering, IT, and plant operations
• improved ability to stabilise production under cyber physical interruption

This aligned resilience capability with essential sector expectations under NIS2 contextual resilience obligations.

4. Supplier and component continuity assurance for production stability
Manufacturing disruption often escalates through upstream supplier failure.

Resilience Guard strengthened supplier continuity oversight through:

• mapping of high dependency suppliers supporting critical production
• disruption impact modelling across component availability
• substitution governance for supply interruption events
• escalation protocols ensuring continuity of raw material flows

This reduced production exposure driven by external dependency risk.

Quantified outcomes delivered
The engagement produced measurable improvements across plant recovery capability, OT resilience readiness, and continuity maturity.

Recovery time objective improvement

Across critical production lines, the manufacturer achieved:

• 35 to 50 percent reduction in recovery time objectives
• defined restart sequencing reducing uncontrolled downtime escalation
• improved stabilisation speed under disruption simulation exercises

OT resilience uplift

Following integration of OT recovery governance:

• reduced exposure to cyber enabled production interruption
• improved coordination between engineering and cyber response teams
• enhanced ability to restore safe operational control environments

Continuity maturity uplift across plants
A structured maturity scoring model was applied across production regions.

Initial maturity variance:

• Level 2 developing at decentralized plant environments
• Level 4 managed at mature flagship production sites
Post engagement baseline:
• Level 4 maturity achieved across all critical production continuity domains
• roadmap established toward Level 5 optimised industrial resilience assurance

Audit and stakeholder assurance enhancement

The manufacturer strengthened evidence supporting:

• ISO 22301 aligned continuity governance
• essential sector resilience expectations
• contractual delivery continuity assurance
• executive visibility of plant level recovery capability
Leadership reported significantly improved confidence in production continuity stability.

Explore related sector resilience case studies
Resilience Guard supports multinational organisations across critical sectors including:

• Energy and terminal infrastructure resilience
→ Explore the energy case study

• Telecommunications connectivity disruption preparedness
→ Explore the telecommunications case study

• Transportation and aviation mobility continuity programmes
→ Explore the transportation case study

• Pharmaceutical supply chain resilience governance
→ Explore the pharma case study

• Technology and distribution ecosystem continuity assurance
→ Explore the technology case study

• Insurance operational resilience and catastrophe continuity
→ Explore the insurance case study

Frequently asked questions: Manufacturing continuity
How does ISO 22301 apply to manufacturing organisations?
ISO 22301 provides the governance framework for business continuity. In manufacturing it ensures production critical operations, restart sequencing, and recovery objectives are measurable, auditable, and embedded across plant environments.

Why is OT resilience essential for industrial continuity?
Manufacturing continuity increasingly depends on operational technology environments. Disruption of control systems can stop production instantly, requiring integrated OT recovery governance.

What measurable outcomes can manufacturing resilience programmes deliver?
High maturity programmes typically achieve:
• 30 to 50 percent faster production recovery
• improved restart sequencing under safety constraints
• stronger supplier disruption continuity oversight
• enhanced resilience maturity across multinational plants

Book your resilience consultation
Resilience Guard GmbH supports industrial manufacturers across Switzerland, Europe, and international markets with award winning expertise in:
• ISO 22301 aligned business continuity
• Plant recovery and production restart governance
• OT resilience and cyber physical disruption preparedness
• Supplier continuity assurance for industrial supply ecosystems
→ Book Your Resilience Consultation