Implementation of Industry 4.0 Principles and Tools: Simulation and Case Study in a Manufacturing SME

Abstract

Small and medium enterprises (SME) face various challenges in order to remain competitive in a global market. Industry 4.0 (I4.0) is increasingly presented as the new paradigm for improving productivity, ensuring economic growth, and guaranteeing the sustainability of manufacturing companies. However, SMEs are ill equipped and lack resources to undertake this digital shift. This paper presents the digital shift process of an SME in a personalized mass production context. Our work provides a better understanding of the interaction between Lean and I4.0. It contributes to the development of Lean 4.0 implementation strategies that are better adapted to manufacturing SMEs in a personalized mass production context. We also demonstrate the usefulness of simulation as a decision-making assistance tool when implementing I4.0. A practical case is documented to fill a gap in the scientific literature identified by several researchers.

Agility and Industry 4.0 Implementation Strategy in a Quebec Manufacturing SME

“…Three cases were already completed with great success, and we compare the results in the discussion section. This case study was chosen using the same methodology [43][44][45].…”

Developing capabilities underlying to Industry 4.0 design principles within the manufacturing context

“…Although these principles have gained theoretical popularity, their practical development and implementation have received limited attention from researchers. Recent studies reveal that these principles are generally complex and hard to achieve within the business context (Abdulnour et al, 2022). More importantly, their implication varies significantly depending on the particularities of the research context.…”

“…Contrary to Industry 4.0 technologies that are generally considered common physical and soft commodities accessible to almost all firms, achieving design principles requires manufacturers to have the ability to absorb necessary knowledge and learn to transform common resources into specific technological capabilities and further integrate them into their business operations. While the design principles of Industry 4.0 are somewhat understudied and ill-defined, the early insights within the scientific literature point to the resource intensity of these principles (Abdulnour et al, 2022;Tortorella et al, 2023). The servitization principle of Industry 4.0 requires manufacturers to innovate some aspects of their business model radically.…”

Integration of Discrete Simulation, Prediction, and Optimization Methods for a Production Line Digital Twin Design

“…The development of manufacturing enterprises, especially automotive or ITC producers, is conditioned by the introduction of modern technologies and the requirement of continuous significant investments in research and development (R&D) [ 1 ]. In addition, there has been a recent trend in strengthening and synergy of two prominent concepts—Lean Management (LM) focused on quality and continuous improvement of processes and services, and Industry 4.0 focused on creating cyber–physical systems [ 2 , 3 , 4 ]. An increase in the level of production automation is observed with a simultaneous increase in the level of flexibility of production systems.…”

“…The production environment is enriched with new network systems (e.g., Internet of Things—IoT), wireless sensor networks (WSN), large data processing systems (Big Data), cloud computing solutions, embedded systems, and the mobile Internet [ 3 , 5 ]. The concept of Industry 4.0 and the implementation of the techniques and methods cited are presented, among others, in [ 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 ].…”