Industrie 4.0

Industry 4.0-related potentials leading to Industry 4.0 implementation mostly remain unclear. Consequently, this paper analyzes potentials that drive manufacturers to implement Industry 4.0 in five industries. Whereas mechanical and plant engineering as well as electrical engineering companies consider business-model driven, operational as well as ecological and social benefits as relevant for Industry 4.0 implementation, the chemical and steel industry widely disregard business-model driven opportunities. The automotive industry merely focuses on operational benefits provided by Industry 4.0.

Industry 4.0 forces companies to keep their business models up-to-date to keep their competitiveness and to satisfy customer demands. Key words like “individual production” and “lot size one” put pressure on companies to adapt their current production to the new requirements. Especially for companies with a mass production this sounds like a 180° turn. Furthermore, no best-practices for introducing industry 4.0 exist and therefore, one cannot rely on such hold points. Nevertheless, a structured transformation of the own business model towards industry is not impossible.

Trends such as Industry 4.0 or the Internet of Things lead to increased networking and integration of various data in the production. At the same time, the increased networking posses challenges regarding security issues. Negative examples involve the unsecured connection of various programmable logic controllers (PLCs) that are reachable through the Internet. In part, but also inadvertently, there are additional risks for the production plant. The reasons are the comfortable maintenance of plants as well as using external support for complex problems.

Technicians and service operators in machine and plant engineering need more and more information to assemble the more complex products. Additional effort is necessary, when technicians have to document their work progress or report problems. One reason for this is that production is generally not integrated into the digital flow of information. Case studies from the industry show the high potential of innovative software solutions by integrating the production perfectly into the digital information flow.

Many companies struggle to determine their own status and strategy when it comes to digitalization and self-organizing production. The Industry 4.0 Maturity Index offers a guideline in this process and helps to ensure future competitiveness. Using the multidimensional maturity model, companies can evaluate their status-quo and develop a roadmap to accelerate their digital development. The case study of a manufacturer of electrical connectivity solutions demonstrates how to reduce costs and increase productivity with the help of the Industry 4.0 Maturity Index.

The economic operation of the offshore wind energy turbines is of fundamental importance for the industry. Due to the prevailing weather conditions at sea these operations require optimal plannung and control. This contribution presents the work process and information requirements of an offshore service company. Suitable industry 4.0 technologies are identified to increase information transparency for the supply chain. In conjunction with a cooperative planning and control instrument, a reliable basis of decison-making for the execution of service assignments can be provided. This constitutes a direct contribution to a reduction of operation costs for offshore service logistics.

There are numerous analysis methods available to support engineers working on continuous improvement projects. Digital transformation facilitates to reduce the effort for data acquisition and processing. The Institute of Production Management and Technology and the medical company Dräger have jointly developed a web application for multi-method analysis. This article describes its data structure and technology.

Technological changes related to Industry 4.0 generate new potentials. Hence, it is important to understand which dimensions of a business model to adapt. Industry 4.0 technologies enable a company to offer new products, new services or to achieve efficiency improvements. The Industry 4.0 business model decomposition allows visualising which goal the initiative has, what the value offering is and which processes, technologies and capabilities are needed. As connectivity is a key dimension of Industry 4.0, technologies and systems are needed to connect internal and external processes.

Recently, a great number of articles, book chapters, conference proceedings, and essays have been published, concerning the fourth industrial revolution or the internet of things. Unfortunately, extent and meaning of these terms become more and more unclear. Thus, a thorough understanding is necessary. Although a lot of studies are carried out to analyze potentials and threats of implementing respective elements into business, it is essential to compare expert’s perception with existing notions. In this work, both a quantitative analysis and a qualitative analysis were undertaken to identify several factors inhibiting or stimulating a further usage, by using a TOE framework. The results of both the survey and the interviews with several experts are explained in detail, and summed up into a statement of future prospects.

An investigation of Industry 4.0 project examples of selected companies with a focus on possible resulting business model innovations shows that these innovations can certainly be triggered by Industry 4.0 projects. How-ever, the results of our investigation also show that the share of business model innovations with 22% out of the 158 selected companies is, however, at a rather low range. Disruptive business model innovations are mainly found in companies of the manufacturing industry. Their focus is no longer only on the production or processing of products, but also on a clear added value for the customer. In this article, these aspects are further elaborated and selected study results are presented.