Industry 4.0 provides new paradigms for the industrial management of SMEs. Supported by a growing number of new technologies, this concept appears more flexible and less expensive than traditional ...enterprise information systems such as ERP and MES. However, SMEs find themselves ill-equipped to face these new possibilities regarding their production planning and control functions. This paper presents a literature review of existing applied research covering different Industry 4.0 issues with regard to SMEs. Papers are classified according to a new framework which allows identification of the targeted performance objectives, the required managerial capacities and the selected group of technologies for each selected case. Our results show that SMEs do not exploit all the resources for implementing Industry 4.0 and often limit themselves to the adoption of Cloud Computing and the Internet of Things. Likewise, SMEs seem to have adopted Industry 4.0 concepts only for monitoring industrial processes and there is still absence of real applications in the field of production planning. Finally, our literature review shows that reported Industry 4.0 projects in SMEs remained cost-driven initiatives and there in still no evidence of real business model transformation at this time.
SMEs, as prominent actors in industry, must meet more and more complex customer expectations. Recently, the concept of Industry 4.0 has emerged. This new approach enables the control of production ...processes by providing real-time synchronisation of flows and by enabling the production of unitary and customised products. Our research goal is to identify Industry 4.0 risks, opportunities and critical success factors with regards to the industrial performance of SMEs. The recent emergence of Industry 4.0 and the inherent difficulty of identifying detailed examples has not yet enabled a satisfactory statistical study to be conducted on Industry 4.0 cases in SMEs. To reach our research goal, we selected 12 experts to conduct a Delphi study supplemented by Régnier's abacuses. Our study demonstrates that the major risks facing the adoption of Industry 4.0 in SMEs include a lack of expertise and a short-term strategy mindset. Our research also indicates that training is the most important factor for success, that managers have a prominent role in the success and/or failure of an Industry 4.0 project, and that SMEs should be supported by external experts. Lastly, Industry 4.0 offers a unique opportunity to redesign SME production processes and to adopt new business models.
The purpose of this article is to propose a guide for the digital transformation (4.0) of a manufacturing SME’s medium-term production planning process, the master production schedule (MPS). A model ...of the current MPS process of a group of SMEs is presented as a starting point toward digitization. The current state of this process reveals a lack of tools to support decision making and the need to increase the reliability of input data and to make the process more agile. Industry 4.0 technologies and process modeling could increase agility in the planning process. However, the digital transformation of medium-term planning activities in SMEs has not been studied. To fill this gap, a group of six experts was consulted. The novelty of this study was to identify the Industry 4.0 technologies that could improve medium-term planning and integrate them into a standardized MPS process model. This model is an ultimate point of digitization that cannot be achieved immediately by any SME, but only after several cycles of planning, deployment, and improvement. Therefore, this research also provides a method to help SMEs determine how to start the digitization of their MPS process.
This paper provides an initial systematic review of journal publications on ERP and Information Systems (IS) integration. Three essential types of integration are proposed to analyze the body of the ...literature (Technical, Business and Socio-Organizational). To complete the review, three additional axes of study are synthesized (Implementation Stage, Company Size and Research Methodology). Finally, results are discussed and opportunities for future research are presented.
Acteurs majeurs de l’industrie, les PME (Petites et Moyennes Entreprises) doivent répondre à des exigences toujours plus complexes de leurs clients. L’une des solutions est l’amélioration du pilotage ...des processus industriels qui comprend la planification et l’exploitation des ressources, le contrôle de la production, la mesure et l’évaluation de la performance. Récemment est né le concept d’industrie 4.0 qui vise au pilotage de la chaîne logistique par la synchronisation en temps réel des flux pour tendre à la fabrication unitaire et personnalisée. Ce concept se base sur l’émergence de nouvelles technologies telles que l’internet des objets et le cloud computing. Notre objectif est d’identifier les risques, les opportunités et les facteurs critiques de succès de l’industrie 4.0 concernant la performance industrielle des PME. Nos premiers travaux montrent que les PME présentent des caractéristiques managériales propres qui peuvent venir à l’encontre des prérequis nécessaires à l’exploitation de l’industrie 4.0. Notre revue de la littérature montre d’une part des disparités dans les cas d’application de l’industrie 4.0 dans les PME, et d’autre part que ces cas sont peu documentés. La difficulté inhérente à l’identification de cas concrets ne nous a pas permis d’organiser une étude statistique de l’application de l’industrie 4.0. Afin de répondre à nos objectifs, nous avons ainsi organisé une étude prospective par consultation d’experts. Cette étude a montré que le manque d’expertise et la stratégie à courte vue sont les risques les plus importants de l’industrie 4.0 dans les PME. L’étude montre également que la formation est le facteur de réussite le plus important, que le dirigeant joue un rôle prépondérant dans la réussite et/ou l’échec d’un projet industrie 4.0 et qu’il est conseillé de se faire accompagner par des experts pour tout projet d’industrie 4.0. Enfin, l’industrie 4.0 est une opportunité exceptionnelle de repenser les processus de production, mais également de proposer de nouveaux modèles d’affaires pour les PME. Les PME présentent des atouts majeurs face à cette révolution industrielle et elles doivent en tirer profit pour ne pas perdre leur avantage concurrentiel vis-à-vis des grandes entreprises.
The SMEs, predominant actors of the industry, have to reach customer expectations that are more and more complex. One of the solutions is to improve the management of the industrial processes which includes production planning and control, performance measurement and evaluation. Lately the concept of industry 4.0 has emerged. This new approach allows the control of production processes by providing real time synchronization of flows and by enabling the production of unitary and customized products. This concept is based on emerging new technologies such as cloud computing and Internet of Things. Our research goal is to identify the industry 4.0 risks, opportunities and critical success factors regarding SMEs industrial performances. Our first work shows that the SMEs have their own specific managerial features that may undermine the adoption of the industry 4.0 concept. Our review of the scientific literature also shows that there are disparities between industry 4.0 business cases in SMEs. These business cases are also poorly documented a provide only few insights for SMEs managers. The inherent difficulty to identify detailed examples prevented us from conducting a statistical study of the industry 4.0 cases within SMEs. In order to reach our research goal, we conducted a prospective study by consulting experts. Our study shows that the major risks facing the adoption of the industry 4.0 concept in SMEs is the lack of expertise and the short-term strategy mindset. The study also shows that training is the most important success factor, that managers have a prominent role in the success and/or the failure of an industry 4.0 project, and that SMEs should be supported by external experts. Lastly, industry 4.0 offers a unique opportunity to redesign SMEs production processes and to adopt new business models. SMEs have decisive advantages toward this industrial revolution that they must use in order to keep their competitive advantages against large company.
The purpose of this article is to explore the difficulties experienced when implementing Lean Manufacturing in small and medium sized enterprises (SME). In this work, we draw up a dual evaluation ...focusing first on the key characteristics of SMEs and then on the management principles of Lean Manufacturing. Based on an analysis of the scientific literature, we observe a number of conflicts between the characteristics identified for SMEs and Lean Manufacturing. The absence of functional organization, lack of methodology and deficiency of formal procedures are often the cause of difficulties experienced by SMEs during the implementation of Lean practices. The analysis of the literature suggests that the notions of leadership, expertise and decision-making are crucial when implementing Lean Manufacturing. However, in the framework of SMEs, these elements tend to be concentrated under the responsibility of the head of the enterprise, leading to several strengths and weaknesses for such implementation.
Through the decades, production planning activities have sought to balance market requirements and the optimal use of available resources in different industries. In the context of the Fourth ...Industrial Revolution, this study aims to disclose the purposes of production planning activities. To this end, this paper provides a literature review of the existing offer of production planning applications over the past 10 years. The authors propose a framework based on the objectives, scope and resources. The research conducted demonstrates that due to the uncertainty of the external environment, research propositions on production planning are focused on shorter planning horizons. The research also indicates that in order to face disruptions, production planning applications are mainly addressed to balance resource utilization. Ultimately, the study shows that a considerable part of innovative production planning applications have not yet been applied to real industrial cases, and moreover, they remain experimental propositions with no further use.
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