Machines can perform incredibly fast, so manufacturing of goods in high demand can be mechanized using a variety of machines.  These machines can be changed over for different products, but for the most part are designed with one or two operations in mind.  In the computer analogy, these are like the big code breaking machines from WW2 before they came up with programmable ones.

Robots are another step above that because they be reprogrammed to do different things, but once they are in place, if you want to make anything drastically different you have to go there and move the robots around and reconfigure them.  

To get anywhere near the flexibility we have with software, robots and machines will have to get much more flexible.  There's no Moore's law in manufacturing, but continuous improvement will get us there eventually.  One point where the analogy fails is distance.  I can write a web app that uses SaaS companies like Stripe (credit cards) and Postmark (transactional email) and I don't have to worry about where they're located.  In a MaaS where there are transportation costs, it matters where my parts and materials come from.  That's why companies  buy these “expensive production devices.”

I work in manufacturing (http://www.garvey.com).  We help companies make their automated packaging systems more efficient.