Drivers and Barriers for Industry 4.0 Readiness and Practice: A SME Perspective with Empirical Evidence

The technological development is moving rapidly enabling manufacturing companies with new possibilities for digital transformations to offer products and services to current and new markets at competitive costs. Such modern technologies are, among others, discussed under the umbrella term Industry 4.0. This paper reports on the results of a questionnaire-survey of 308 small and medium-sized manufacturers about their readiness for digitalized manufacturing and their actual practice in this area. The paper provides empirical evidence for that perceived drivers for Industry 4.0 lead to increased Industry 4.0 readiness, which, in turn, leads to a higher degree of practicing Industry 4.0. The paper also finds that barriers make companies less Industry 4.0 ready but this apparently does not have any significant impact on Industry 4.0 practice. The results are of importance for companies in planning transformation processes towards digitalized processes

Modernizing the Manufacturing Process in the Context of Industrial Dynamics Challenges

In the context of globalization, fast-moving technologies and a rapidly evolving economy have triggered a new wave of change. Generally known as the Industry 4.0, it has been announced to underline the new industrial revolution. Many industrial, production organizations and companies are exploring this concept, but the criteria for achieving Industry 4.0 are still unclear. This article focuses on the fundamental concepts of the Industry 4.0, the structure of current production systems. The key concept of production, the structure of the supply chain and the impact of customer service on production is also be reviewed to understand how digitalisation and manufacturing are related. The biggest focus in on formulating the Industry 4.0 concept aiming to distinguish and articulate the main characteristics of digitization. On the basis of scientific literature, the concept of manufacturing process and “Industry 4.0” will be analyzed, comparing Lithuanian production trends in the context of digitization

Analysis of industry digitization opportunities in Lithuania

In the context of globalization, fast-moving technologies and a rapidly evolving economy have triggered a new wave of change. Generally known as the Industry 4.0, it has been announced to underline the new industrial revolution. The biggest focus in on formulating the Industry 4.0 concept aiming to distin-guish and articulate the main characteristics of digitization, comparing Lithua-nian production trends in the context of digitizatio

Digital factory in the University of Pannonia Nagykanizsa Campus - the Factory Subsystem

One of the new challenges of the 21st century is the Industry 4.0. Manufacturing companies moving away from mass production and getting closer to customized production and manufacturing of customized products through digitization. The expectations are high, meeting the requirements is a real challenge to industrial partners. In order to help meet the challenges the University of Pannonia Nagykanizsa Campus started to establish a fully automatized industrial laboratory. In this paper the architecture of the Industry 4.0 laboratory and the purpose of the Factory Subsystem is presented

Evaluation of Business Model Innovation towards Industry 4.0 via Cross-industry

Innovation is one of the key drivers of growth, development, and profitability, which increases competitive advantages and has recently been moving towards industry 4.0 technologically. This motivates companies to update their business models (BM) towards industry 4.0. Moreover, there is a technique with the primary characteristics for achieving this motivation called "cross-industry innovation". Cross-industry innovation is a new method of innovation that concerns the creative translation and imitation of existing solutions from other industries for responding to the needs of the current market, sectors, areas, or domains. The challenge is to find out how far managers can rely on that to innovate their BM towards Industry 4.0. The aim of this study was to investigate the application of cross-industry innovation for designing industry 4.0 BM and explore the extent to which companies can rely on it as it has not been used for this purpose previously. This study utilized a database analysis to compare cross-industry innovation practices with industry 4.0 BM's characteristics in terms of value proposition, value creation, and value capture levels. In addition, some interviews were conducted with companies that had previously implemented cross-industry innovation to validate and generalize the results. The results indicated that cross-industry innovation practices can better fulfill flexible and dynamic networks, connected information flows, high efficiency, high scalability, and high availability in terms of value creation as well as variabilization of prices and costs in terms of value capture. Therefore, it demonstrated that cross-industry innovation was a more dependable and applicable strategy for designing the BM of Industry 4.0 than current practices

Investigating Potential Interventions on disruptive impacts of Industry 4.0 technologies in Circular Supply chains: Evidence from SMEs of an Emerging Economy

As a transversal theme, the intertwining of digitalization and sustainability has crossed all Supply Chains (SCs) levels dealing with widespread environmental and societal concerns. This paper investigates the potential interventions and disruptive impacts that Industry 4.0 technologies may have on pharmaceutical Circular SCs (CSCs). To accomplish this, a novel method involving a literature review and Pythagorean fuzzy-Delphi has initially been employed to identify and screen categorized lists of Industry 4.0 Disruptive Technologies (IDTs) and their impacts on pharmaceutical CSC. Subsequently, the weight of finalized impacts and the performance score of finalized IDTs have simultaneously been measured via a novel version of Pythagorean fuzzy SECA (Simultaneously Evaluation of Criteria and Alternatives). Then, the priority of each intervention for disruptive impacts of Industry 4.0 has been determined via the Hanlon method. This is one of the first papers to provide in-depth insights into advancing the study of the disruptive action of Industry 4.0 technologies cross-fertilizing CE throughout pharmaceutical SCs in the emerging economy of Iran. The results indicate that digital technologies such as Big Data Analytics, Global Positioning Systems, Enterprise Resource Planning, and Digital Platforms are quite available in the Irans' pharmaceutical industry. These technologies, along with four available interventions, e.g., environmental regulations, subsidy, fine, and reward, would facilitate moving towards a lean, agile, resilient, and sustainable supply chain through the efficient utilization of resources, optimized waste management, and substituting the human workforce by machines

Perspectives on Cyber Security for Offshore Oil and Gas Assets

In an ever-evolving technological industry, the oil and gas sector is already moving forward through the adaptation of Industry 4.0 and the adaptation of advanced cyber technologies through Oil and Gas 4.0. As IT/OT (information technology/operational technology) systems are evolving technologically, so are the cyber security threats faced by the offshore oil and gas assets. This paper aims to raise the awareness of cyber security threats and the organizational and technical measures that need to be adopted by the oil and gas industry for remote and complex assets in the upstream sector. A comprehensive literature review covering the areas of new IT/OT systems integration and cyber security risk analysis and management is presented. The results of a survey on the subject of cyber security for offshore oil and gas assets are also presented, and they provide valuable insight into the current industry culture and the perception of cyber security concepts. The importance of organizational culture, personnel training and involvement, as well as corporate engagement and support in the subject of cyber security is highlighted

Perspectives on Cyber Security for Offshore Oil and Gas Assets

In an ever-evolving technological industry, the oil and gas sector is already moving forward through the adaptation of Industry 4.0 and the adaptation of advanced cyber technologies through Oil and Gas 4.0. As IT/OT (information technology/operational technology) systems are evolving technologically, so are the cyber security threats faced by the offshore oil and gas assets. This paper aims to raise the awareness of cyber security threats and the organizational and technical measures that need to be adopted by the oil and gas industry for remote and complex assets in the upstream sector. A comprehensive literature review covering the areas of new IT/OT systems integration and cyber security risk analysis and management is presented. The results of a survey on the subject of cyber security for offshore oil and gas assets are also presented, and they provide valuable insight into the current industry culture and the perception of cyber security concepts. The importance of organizational culture, personnel training and involvement, as well as corporate engagement and support in the subject of cyber security is highlighte

Performance measurement and management. A literature review focussed on the role played by management theories with a deep dive into the industry 4.0 environment

PURPOSE: The aim of this paper is to review the theoretical lenses used in performance measurement and management in a traditional and industry 4.0 environment and to contribute to understanding the current state of research in the field and its future development. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH: This paper performs a structured review of the existing performance measurement and management literature, with the objective to investigate the current state of research, looking at popular theories in more detail, as well as to propose possible avenues for future consideration for the field to develop further moving forward. Particularly, this paper focusses on and identifies (1) theoretical lenses that are dominating this field, (2) the role played by specific theories and the way different theories are used together and finally, (3) an in-depth dive into relevant theories for performance measurement and management applied in an industry 4.0 environment. FINDINGS: Key findings highlight the growing number of publications, leading authors and journals where research is published. The findings also include the identification and detailed analysis of the most popular theories leveraged by scholars also in reference to research methodologies. A thorough analysis of Industry 4.0 performance measurement and management is then carried out, as this is one of the identified emerging themes in the research field. Findings here include the identification of relevant research and the suggestion of significant theories that can help build this specific body of knowledge. ORIGINALITY/VALUE: This research offers a key contribution by providing a powerful “theoretical toolkit” to researchers and practitioners working in performance measurement and management and industry 4.0 fields