A paternoster manufacturer is the company which fabricates and provides the major hardware, including cabins or platforms, tracks, and lift mechanisms, for the paternoster(s) currently in use within a structure. Paternosters function like elevators but consist of continuously moving platforms arranged in a loop.

The hardware supports a continuous loop of platforms or cabins. Tracks and lifting mechanisms form part of that moving arrangement, rather than a set of separate elevators making individual trips.

An elevator manufacturer supplies elevator hardware, while the paternoster manufacturer is identified by the continuously circulating system. The common purpose of vertical transport does not remove the difference in the supplied machinery.