A proliferation of technological advances often described under the umbrella term of Industry 4.0 (I4.0), are increasingly changing the way firms operate as they improve their productivity and performance (Wagner and Walton, 2016). Despite a substantial body of literature have examined I4.0 at the firm level, its effect on regions and territories is largely remaining unexplored (Rüßmann et al., 2015). A wealth of advanced technologies and systems such as artificial intelligence, smart systems, smart cities, predictive analytics, blockchain, autonomous vehicles, Big Data, Internet of Things increasingly change not only the companies that adopt them but also the context within which this adoption take place (Schwab, 2016)
