Industry 4.0 in detail

How do medium-sized companies find a way into the digital transformation of their production? The Fraunhofer Institutes IAO and IPA have conducted a global survey of companies within the framework of the short study "Industry 4.0 in Practice" to provide orientation for companies based on successful Industry 4.0 applications for their own technological implementations.

New information and communication technologies are increasingly becoming part of everyday industrial life. However, while large companies are already successfully shaping digital transformation, medium-sized companies often lack guidance for digitalizing their value chains. Industry 4.0 applications offer particular advantages to German SMEs, positioning them as pioneers of innovative solutions on an international level. The perception of Industry 4.0 worldwide and what successful project implementation looks like in concrete terms are demonstrated by the results of the international short study "Industry 4.0 in Practice," conducted by the Fraunhofer Institutes for Industrial Engineering and Organization IAO and for Production Technology and Automation IPA, and published by the ALLIANCE Industry 4.0 Baden-Württemberg. The primary goal of the study was to provide orientation for industrial companies in Baden-Württemberg to help them develop their own Industry 4.0 applications based on concrete implementation examples.

International differences in the application of Industry 4.0

As part of the study, 17 companies from Japan, Taiwan, and the USA, among others, were surveyed about their experiences with implementing Industry 4.0 applications between May and December 2021.

In an international comparison, it becomes evident that the German-speaking companies surveyed tend to use people-centered technologies, whereas in Asia, Oceania, and the USA, technology-centered solutions predominate. There are also clear differences in project organization. Especially foreign companies rely on specialized Industry 4.0 project teams.

Theme map shows application potentials for Industry 4.0

Based on the survey, successful use cases for Industry 4.0 solutions were identified and mapped onto a thematic map covering eight areas, from qualification to networked production systems. Simon Schumacher, study leader at Fraunhofer IPA, comments on the theme map: "With the theme map, we have translated a framework designed in the Future Work Lab into practice and tested its suitability in this study. The theme map offers companies the opportunity to orient themselves with their own use cases within the thematic categories and to initiate coordinated development."

To reflect the versatile and especially different approaches and implementation possibilities of the surveyed countries, the study also presents some success recipes for international projects of various sizes and with broad technology applications. Based on the identified Industry 4.0 use cases, the theme map, and implementation examples from international industrial companies, the short study also derives very concrete recommendations for the successful introduction of Industry 4.0 and provides further guidance for the digital transformation of companies in Baden-Württemberg.