Most plants already have the data they need. That's not the problem. The problem is that having data and using data are two different things.
Think about everything a plant collects in a day. Production counts on the line sheet. Quality rejects in a logbook. Energy use on the bill. Maintenance notes in someone's head. Material usage in a spreadsheet nobody opens after Friday. None of it is hidden. It's all there.
Now ask a simple question: when was the last time someone put it together? Production counts tell you how much was made. Reject rates tell you how much was thrown away. Energy figures tell you what it took to run the place. Put them on the same page and suddenly you can see which line wastes the most, which shift runs the dirtiest, which product loses the most yield. Separately, they're just numbers. Together, they're answers.
This is where most operations stall. The data exists, but it lives in five places, owned by five people, in five formats. Nobody's job is to connect them. So it sits. Week after week, the plant keeps collecting data and keeps running on gut feel.
Data you don't use isn't an asset. It's clutter. The difference between a plant that has data and a plant that uses it isn't software — it's one person sitting down with the numbers and asking what they're saying.
You probably don't need more data. You need someone to look at what you already have.