With its high export ratio, the plant and mechanical engineering sector is a flagship of the German economy. The products represent high quality, a high level of innovation and, lastly, a strong customer focus. According to the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi), Germany is the world’s third largest producer of machinery, and the industry is dominated by medium-sized enterprises to this day. The main sales markets are...

Many companies are already deploying Industry 4.0 technologies. With Industry 4.0, they are primarily pursuing the objectives of increased productivity, reduced costs, improved quality, and shorter product launch times. New business models still have a minor role to play.

If we accept this proposition, the first question to ask is: what is innovation?

We are living in the VUCA@WORLD (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity): high volatility of demand, growing uncertainty in markets, rising complexity, the individualisation of products, and the development of entirely novel technologies permanently accompany every company nowadays.

From the ideal supply chain to the digitised value creation network. The supply chain management that is familiar to us, based on the integration of suppliers, manufacturers and customers, is being transformed into an ecosystem of companies that are organised in cloud platforms. In the new digital value creation network, data transparency and integration and confidence are leading to higher productivity.