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Data is considered “new gold” or “oil of the 21st century”. Big Data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) based on it enable us to optimize existing processes in companies and to develop new, disruptive business models. Technological innovations benefit consumers, businesses, society and the environment. But the undisputed benefits and opportunities of digitization are related to risks of misuse of data, ethical issues and the risk of rebound effects. The increasing global interconnectedness of the economy makes nation-state regulations impossible. Companies are therefore called upon to make digitization sustainable right from the start on the basis of a voluntary commitment.

In the German manufacturing industry, there is actually one backshoring company on every three offshoring companies. The most important reasons for backshoring are losses in flexibility and delivery capability as well as quality problems. Results of a large firm-level survey in the German manufacturing industry show a clear, positive correlation between the use of technologies for the digital integration of production processes (Industry 4.0) and the backshoring propensity of German companies. This paves the way for local value chains in close proximity to important customers.

In light of the three major global transformations of globalization, digitalization and sustainabilization industrial production faces new challenges and targets. On the one hand industrial modernization in the direction of digital manufacturing (Industry 4.0) has to cope with the new protectionist policies that have started in the United States as a countermovement to globalization. On the other hand, the new vocal demand for climate protection and environmental quality assurance puts pressure on the industry to align its policies with the demand for ecological modernization. It is essential that industrial policy makers include not only efficiency goals as targets for their investment plans but also environmental quality and social compatibility. Keywords:

The digital transformation continues to progress. In the course of this digital change, new technologies are constantly being developed and topics such as artificial intelligence, big data analytics or blockchain are moving into the focus of companies and the general public. Blockchain technology attracted a great deal of attention with its first application Bitcoin.

Profit is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for long-term business success. Global problems such as climate change, depletion of natural resources and overpopulation, but also local environmental pollution and emphasis on social aspects increase the significance of sustainability for enterprises. Sustainability is already implemented in the guiding principles of all DAX 30 enterprises and accepted as maxim of action by 90 % of Fortune 500 enterprises [1]. Starting from a definition of sustainability, the subsequent contribution discusses sustainability effects of industry 4.0 concerning the economic, ecologic, and social dimension [2].

Industry 4.0 describes the digitization and interconnection of industrial value creation. So far, economic and technological potentials have been considered in particular, while ecological opportunities through industry 4.0 receive less attention. This article examines the ecological potentials of Industry 4.0 in terms of resources, energy consumption, logistics and transport, waste and emissions, from which propositions are derived. The study attempts to better understand of the ecological potentials of Industry 4.0 in order to contribute to more sustainable industrial value creation.

The food distribution of (deep) refrigerated goods is a steadily growing market segment that deals with sustainability in particular. Due to the high efficiency of the CEP service providers, a shipment as such is not necessarily worse than a shopping trip by car over several kilometers in town. A concrete approach to improve ecological sustainability in food delivery is the substitution of existing PE plastic bags filled with dry ice. The bags help to keep the dry ice together and protect the customer from burns. The following article analyzes ecological aspects of food shipment and conveys an understanding of current development concerning biodegradable plastic films. Due to special material properties of bio-based plastic films, the manufacturability of dry ice bags was investigated in a series of experiments. Dry ice bags were manufactured by means of the very precisely adjustable joining technology ultrasonic welding. Subsequent, load capacity of the dry ice bags was examined.

The future energy concept from the German federal government declares that by 2050, the primary energy requirement should be reduced to 80 %. Achieving this goal requires many local implementations. At teaching and research facilities, a large number of rooms and other spaces are used temporarily. That use usually happens over a predetermined period. The observance of the specific usage period of teaching rooms, in particular of internal teaching rooms, was used to design and implement a future-oriented energy concept for a lecture room. The concept was created to show how technical building services could be used. This work describes our concept’s principle, methodology, and implementation. This concept can also be used for energy optimization in other teaching rooms.

Trends towards more customized products and shorter product life cycles are creating challenges, which companies are trying to meet with the use of Industrie 4.0 technologies. The digitalization and automation associated with this is causing employees in the manufacturing industry in particular to fear changes in work processes and requirements. This paper proposes four key socio-technical design measures to enable enterprises to cope with the new demands of human work in Industrie 4.0 - and thus to counteract fears. The focus is on increasing entrepreneurial agility and expanding employee skills.

The GDPR’s state of the art is a reference term - decoupled from fixed technical and organizational standards at a given time. Therefore, it is vital to define how requirements should be methodically derived from the state of the art, as stating no hint in the regulation led to insecurities amongst the GDPR’s addressees. This article presents an approach from the German IT association TeleTrust which can help companies to reduce their insecurities. The problems with the state of the art in the effort saver digital world are shown on the example of identification and consent.