Emerson Expands NI Nigel AI Across Test Automation Software Portfolio

Global automation company Emerson expanded its NI Nigel AI technology across its test and measurement software portfolio, adding prompt-based code generation capabilities and broader AI-assisted engineering workflows for customers in aerospace, semiconductor, transportation, and other regulated industries.

The announcement came during the company’s annual NI Connect conference on May 13. According to the company’s announcement, Nigel AI will expand into the NI LabVIEW+ Suite and later integrate with NI FlexLogger, NI InstrumentStudio, NI TestStand, and NI SystemLink. The company said the updates are expected to become available later in 2026.

The move extends Emerson’s broader industrial AI strategy, which has increasingly focused on embedding AI directly into operational and engineering systems tied to manufacturing, testing, and infrastructure environments. Recent deployments have included AI-enabled applications for Ovation power and water systems, DeltaV operational software, and AspenTech industrial automation platforms.

Manufacturers deploying AI into production environments are increasingly focusing on workflow optimization, predictive maintenance, and shorter design-to-production cycles, areas that have become central to broader investments in AI-powered manufacturing systems.

Emerson Pushes AI Into Engineering and Validation Workflows

Emerson described Nigel AI as a test-optimized AI system built specifically for engineering environments that require reliability, traceability, and operational control. The company said the expanded platform is designed to help engineers accelerate product development and validation without compromising measurement integrity or safety requirements.

“The NI platform has evolved through every major shift in technology, continually improving how test engineers reach their goals,” Ritu Favre, President of Emerson’s Test and Measurement business, said in the company’s announcement.

Favre added that the platform’s differentiation comes from the integration of hardware, software, operational data, and ecosystem support rather than a standalone AI feature.

According to Emerson, internal engineering teams used Nigel AI to reduce test development and troubleshooting processes from days or hours to minutes in some scenarios.

The announcement also reflects broader shifts across semiconductor and industrial engineering environments where AI systems are increasingly being integrated into testing and validation infrastructure. Companies developing advanced chip systems and industrial electronics have been investing heavily in AI-assisted testing platforms as hardware complexity and validation workloads continue to increase. Similar efforts are also emerging in semiconductor inspection and validation systems tied to NVIDIA infrastructure deployments and real-time testing architectures, including recent developments in AI-driven semiconductor testing workflows.

Industrial AI Expands Beyond Analytics Systems

Emerson has spent the past year expanding AI functionality across multiple industrial software layers tied to operations, plant engineering, and maintenance systems.

Earlier this month, the company introduced the AspenTech AVA platform, which it described as an enterprise-scale industrial AI system designed to support operational decision-making across industrial environments. The company has also expanded AI-enabled functionality across DeltaV systems and its Guardian Digital Platform customer support infrastructure.

On LinkedIn, Emerson recently outlined several AI-related updates focused on autonomous operations, including Ovation AI-enabled applications for power and water plants and AspenTech Optiplant systems designed to automate plant layout design processes.

Industrial companies are increasingly embedding AI directly into operational equipment, engineering workflows, and simulation systems rather than limiting deployments to analytics dashboards. The effectiveness of those systems often depends on access to operational data generated across existing industrial infrastructure, an issue that has become increasingly important as factories modernize legacy systems and operational environments. Similar modernization efforts are reshaping how manufacturers connect older production systems with AI-enabled operational infrastructure in areas such as industrial equipment digitization.

Emerson said companies including NVIDIA, Alstom, Valeo, Zap Energy, and Cyth Systems participated in NI Connect presentations discussing how they are using Emerson’s test and measurement technologies to accelerate product development and validation workflows.