A Framework to Support Manufacturing Digitalization

Industry 4.0 adoption may be the quintessential industry gamechanger, particularly for manufacturing companies. Despite known benefits of Industry 4.0 adoption, effecting digital transformation remains a challenge in the manufacturing industry due to unsuitable digitalization frameworks and directions that do not optimize for value creation given the specifics of each company. To this end, this chapter proposes a digitalization framework that can be realistically employed by manufacturing companies to roadmap Industry 4.0 adoption. Specifically, a review of existing digitalization frameworks for the manufacturing industry is conducted. Thereafter, a manufacturing digitalization framework is proposed. Finally, the manufacturing digitalization framework is validated against existing digitalization frameworks and through feedback from actual project implementation with potential benefits and future improvements discussed.