Whenever a new calendar year begins, industries and businesses like to reflect on the past year as well as look ahead at what's on the horizon. Since it's that time of year, let's take a look at what two manufacturing gurus have predicted about the industry's trends in 2015 that will create a stir in the sector.

Chet Namboodri is the global lead for Cisco's manufacturing industry and frequently writes on manufacturing topics on Cisco Blogs. With 20 years of experience in manufacturing and a BA and master's degree in engineering, Namboodri qualifies as an expert.

Namboodri thinks the top three trends in manufacturing in 2015 include,

1. More robots: Improvements in and the increased use of industrial robotics will accelerate across many segments in 2015. Better performance and lessening of total wages are two big elements in manufacturing's interest in robotics. Watch out — HAL may be on your factory floor before you know it!

2. Less reshoring: The advancement of manufacturing in the United States and bringing back offshore manufacturing will begin to slow down in 2015. The betting is that 2015 will see an uptick in the economy. But China is trying hard to stem the flow of manufacturing from their shores. India capped its successful Mars mission with the announcement of a "Make in India" campaign designed to let consumers know that India is synonymous with great workmanship and great value.

3. More data: Big Data analytics will emerge as a valuable tool with traction and scale across all of the elements of the value chain. Big Data already is used in manufacturing, plant design, workflow processes, quality testing and so much more. In 2015, the data will be linked to each area and used to further advance the role of big data across your facility.

Michael Koteloc is the global practice leader for Verizon Enterprise Solutions. Working in the manufacturing sector for more than 20 years gives him a unique glimpse at ways the manufacturing advances in the coming year. Koteloc sees major changes in manufacturing in 2015.

1. Bringing the SMAC: A main driver of the United States' comeback in manufacturing is thanks to SMAC social, mobile, analytics and cloud. According to Koteloc, SMAC is a needed tool whose technology belongs in every manufacturer's toolkit. SMAC is aiding early adopters in the manufacturing sector make needed changes and improve efficiencies.

2. Educated customers: In the near future, social media will change the traditional business-to-business model into a B2B2C. The reason he believes this will happen is that today's consumers are well-educated buyers and, thanks to the Internet, expect to get whatever they want to buy on demand. Social media is their communications platform. Choice, recommendations and reviews from social media contacts carry a lot of weight toward their decision.

3. Educated workers: The manufacturing workforce will continue to be better educated than in the past. Routine production line work will go to robots and more workers with degrees in science and engineering will work in plants where they can run sophisticated technical systems. Others will be able to give their time to R&D a section of manufacturing giving new meaning to having a career in manufacturing.

4. Capital investment: During the last quarter of 2014, capital investment began to show life. When capital is available to take advantage of technology, it can be used for other purposes to improve a company.

5. Next-shoring: Many economic factors such as higher wages in Asia, more expensive shipping and the desire for faster time to market are having more companies move manufacturing closer to retail to meet the demand of merchants and customers. This is known as "next-shoring" and offers manufacturers the opportunity to replenish store shelves rapidly. Next-shoring cuts costs of shipping, docking and warehousing products to move inventory faster.

Manufacturing has a bright future, according to these two experts. Perhaps we will revisit their predictions in six months and see how they are doing.