Past, present and future of Industry 4.0 - a systematic literature review and research agenda proposal

• Published in: International Journal of Production Research Vol. 55; no. 12; pp. 3609 - 3629
• Main Authors: Liao, Yongxin, Deschamps, Fernando, Loures, Eduardo de Freitas Rocha, Ramos, Luiz Felipe Pierin
• Format: Journal Article Book Review
• Language: English
• Published: London Taylor & Francis 18.06.2017; Taylor & Francis LLC
• Subjects: Categories; Computer programs; Conferences; Data analysis; Hardware; Industrial Revolution; Industry 4.0; Literature reviews; Production planning; Qualitative research; quantitative research; research agenda; Software; systematic literature review; Systematic review; the fourth Industrial revolution
• ISSN: 0020-7543; 1366-588X
• DOI: 10.1080/00207543.2017.1308576

Over the last few years, the fourth industrial revolution has attracted more and more attentions all around the world. In the current literature, there is still a lack of efforts to systematically review the state of the art of this new industrial revolution wave. The aim of this study is to address this gap by investigating the academic progresses in Industry 4.0. A systematic literature review was carried out to analyse the academic articles within the Industry 4.0 topic that were published online until the end of June 2016. In this paper, the obtained results from both the general data analysis of included papers (e.g. relevant journals, their subject areas and categories, conferences, keywords) and the specific data analysis corresponding to four research sub-questions are illustrated and discussed. These results not only summarise the current research activities (e.g. main research directions, applied standards, employed software and hardware), but also indicate existing deficiencies and potential research directions through proposing a research agenda. Findings of this review can be used as the basis for future research in Industry 4.0 and related topics.