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A robust and resilient supply chain is a critical success factor for the competitiveness of manufacturing companies. However, today’s supply chain faces various challenges, such as higher complexities and increasing dynamics coming from megatrends (i. e. globalization and sustainability). The medium-sized drive technology industry, with its global supply chains and high customer requirements, is particularly affected by these challenges. Therefore, digitalization initiatives are crucial. This article analyzes current digitalization projects in the drive technology industry in order to identify relevant trends and fields of application. Synthesized from the industry's target picture for higher resilience/ flexibility, greater transparency and more sustainability along the supply chain, these provide guidance for medium-sized companies and their digitalization strategies. (Only in German)

To show SMEs a way to identify changes at an early stage, the interactive situation awareness monitor developed by Fraunhofer IPK is used. This gives companies an individually structured overview about their environment and their company (e. g. order situation). The area of the corporate environment is currently being expanded to include the compa- ny-specific component of automatic recognition of context-related data in order to provide relevant information to a company automatically. For this purpose, a machine learning model is developed and trained using company-specific data sets. First- ly, it is necessary to create the data sets with relevant and irrelevant environment information. For that, the PESTEL analysis is applied in this paper. Further- more, advantages and disadvantages of the analy- sis for generating data sets are discussed.

Supported by an intelligent assistance system, the sustainability and digitalisation of the tideindependent Industriehafen Bremen can be increased. To guarantee port security, a constant level of the isolated harbour is essential. There is great potential for increasing energy efficiency if the lock naturally waters the harbour basin at times of high tide instead of employing a pump station. This contribution shows how artificial intelligence and innovative software systems were used to develop an assistance system to improve existing procedures without making extensive changes to the existing port infrastructure. (Only in German)

This article aims to develop a model for the acceptance of RPA technologies based on the presentation of the state-of-the-art. The model is the basis of an empirical study on the acceptance of robot-assisted process automation (RPA) at a global technology company. The results of this study are presented in a corresponding publication "An Empirical Analysis of Technology Acceptance of Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (Part 2)".

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the additional challenges that events face in terms of appropriate crowd management. This paper is dedicated analyzing these challenges and existing approaches for the safe operation of events during pandemics. Based on this, an innovative framework is presented that uses intelligent crowd analysis and is applicable to an environment with volatile groups. In addition, the specifiv use case of trade fair events is considered in this framework.

The introduction of new Industry 4.0 technologies is changing job characteristics in many manual industrial sectors, especially in production and logistics, through automation and digitization. Depending on the extent and degree of maturity, these changes are perceived differently by employees and can have both positive and negative effects on job satisfaction and motivation. This article uses the example of workplaces in in-house logistics to highlight how their characteristics change as a result of the introduction of Industry 4.0 technologies. It also presents a process model that can serve as a decision-making aid for companies to consider important implications for the successful transformation process and to pursue the human-centric design of manual, technically supported workplaces.

As early as 1997, Christian Lindner, now Germany's Minister of Finance, knew that crises and problems are "also just thorny opportunities. What at the time seemed more like a rhetorical, flowery battle cry from a brash young entrepreneur is, in essence, still a resilient, psychological fact today. Shocking strokes of fate or other drastic experiences often literally pull the rug out from under people - and change their perspective on their own lives. However, this forced change of perspective can also be a real opportunity for change for the better, if one has learned to deal with crises and to recognize and seize the opportunities hidden in them.

3D printing has established itself as a production process and has also found its way into the fashion industry. Individualised shoes can be 3D printed, but this poses significant challenges for automated quality control, as defects are rare. Autoencoders enable to train a system with defect-free data so that detected deviations from this state can be evaluated as defects. Our research shows a ROC AUC score of 0.87, proving that this method is suitable for anomaly detection in 3D-printed shoes.

In this article, we discuss the opportunities of digtal supply chains from a supply chain nance perspective. In doing so, we rst highlight the importance of supply chain finance at times of global supply shortages. Then, we explain why digital platforms are necessary in this context and what challenges their introduction entails. Finally, we provide an outlook towards distributed ledger technology and blockchain.

The trend toward digitization o ers considerable potential; this is particularly true in supply chain management (SCM). However, not every technology is suitable for every company and its processes. This article presents a structured approach that supports companies in the selection process. The approach consists of several phases: Starting with the identi cation of business goals and ending with the selection of those technologies that seem most promising. Its applicability was tested in a research project at a logistics service provider. It is easily transferable to a concrete decision-making situation.