Asset theft and equipment loss remain persistent challenges across industries including construction, transportation, utilities and field services, placing increasing pressure on organisations already managing tight margins, labour shortages and complex supply chains. While the financial impact of stolen high-value equipment is well understood, the day-to-day operational disruption caused by missing tools, smaller assets and specialist equipment is often harder to quantify. As businesses look to improve efficiency and resilience, greater visibility into asset location and utilisation has become an increasing priority.
New research from Samsara highlights the scale of this challenge. The company’s 2026 State of Connected Operations (SOCO) Asset Theft & Loss Report, Quantifying the Hidden Cost of Asset Invisibility, finds that equipment theft and loss is not just a replacement-cost problem—it’s a £9.7 million annual operational drain for mid-sized organisations (between £180 million and less than £740 million in annual revenue) without asset tracking.
The bigger surprise is which assets are driving those losses. While heavy machinery theft often makes headlines, the report found that 72% of operational costs stem from disappearing assets valued at less than £7,400, including tools, sensors, generators and specialised parts that organisations rely on every day.
The proprietary study, based on insights from 1,500 financial executives — majority mid-size operations between £180M and <£740M annual revenue — across construction, logistics, field services, and utilities in the United States, Mexico, the United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, and Canada, puts a precise number on a problem the industry has long felt but never been able to quantify. Despite 71% of operations experiencing equipment theft every quarter, and 25% of new equipment budgets going to replace what’s been stolen or lost, the hidden damage runs far deeper: project shutdowns, emergency rentals, idle labour, and contract penalties compound the direct loss into millions in operational costs.
Before deploying Samsara, a single missing piece of equipment could delay a job, idle a crew, and force emergency procurement, all without ever knowing where the asset actually was… With real-time asset visibility, we expect a 100% reduction in unreturned assets, 90% reduction in days outstanding, and our teams spending time on safety and customer service instead of searching for tools. All told, this could add up to millions in recovered operational costs.
said John Chaccour, Director of Technology at Total Safety.
Key findings include:
Equipment theft is a reality, not a rare event
- 71% of operations without asset tracking experience equipment theft every quarter
- 25% of new equipment budgets go to replacing stolen or lost assets
- In the UK & Ireland, 37% of organisations report higher insurance premiums as a direct consequence of asset theft and loss
Small equipment is a hidden driver of losses
- Operations without tracking lose an average of £9.7M annually from direct and indirect costs of missing equipment
- 72% of those operational costs come from missing assets valued under £7.4K, like tools, sensors, and specialised parts
- The “death by a thousand cuts” from disappearing small gear is where the real financial drain occurs
Missing assets drain productivity and halt projects
- 98% of organisations say searching for assets is a daily or weekly occurrence
- At more than a quarter of organisations without real-time visibility, employees spend more than 10 hours per week searching for missing equipment — equivalent to one full-time employee doing nothing but searching for three months a year
- 77% globally (71% in the UK & Ireland) say a missing critical asset caused a significant shutdown or delay in the past 12 months
- Without tracking, the average time to locate a missing asset is 25 days, and 54% of organisations can’t recover even half of their stolen high-value equipment
The gap between organisations with and without asset visibility is not merely operational, it’s financial. Companies investing in tracking are not only recovering assets faster, they’re preventing the secondary costs that compound long after the initial loss.
Find the full report findings here.
