Advances in Production Technology

Abstract

Significant increase in productivity of production systems has been an effect of all past industrial revolutions. In contrast to those industrial revolutions, which were driven by the production industry itself, Industrie 4.0 is pushed forward by an enormous change within the current society due to the invention and frequent usage of social networks in combination with smart devices. This new social behaviour and interaction now makes its presence felt in the industrial sector as companies use the interconnectivity in order to connect production systems and enhance collaboration. As employees bring their own smart devices to work the interconnectivity is brought into the companies as well and Industrie 4.0 is pushed into the companies rather than initiated by the companies themselves. On top of productivity improvement within production the fourth industrial revolution opens up new potentials in indirect departments such as engineering. This focus differentiates Industrie 4.0 from the first three industrial revolutions, which mainly focused on productivity increase by optimising the production process.