MATURITY LEVELS FOR LOGISTICS 4.0 BASED ON NRW'S INDUSTRY 4.0 MATURITY MODEL

Abstract

The development of logistics sector is strongly connected to the development of industry, which just now transforms its production and business models according to Industry 4.0 concept. Industry 4.0 is a current trend of automation and data exchange in manufacturing technologies that includes cyber-physical systems, the Internet of things/services, cloud and cognitive computing. Logistics, an ubiquitous activity, consequently follows this trend and strives to realize the vision of Logistics 4.0, which expands the concept of industry 4.0 in the field of logistics. In doing so, traditional logistics in industrial environments has to lead the development along the evolutionary path determined by the control points, named as maturity levels, in which the development reaches previously defined characteristics, typically in the form of specific assessment items. Maturity is the state of being fully developed and implies an evolutionary progress in the accomplishment of a target from an initial to desired end stage, in our case Logistics 4.0, over a certain number of maturity levels. Maturity models are supportive tools to assess the as-is state, derive and prioritize improvement measures and control the progress. Paper contribute to the development of Logistics 4.0 maturity model, which would help companies to develop needed characteristics for seamless connectivity with mature Industry 4.0 companies.

Although a number of maturity models for industry 4.0 have been developed, maturity models for Logistics 4.0, as an emerging phenomenon, are still in their infancy. Because no dominant design for Logistics 4.0 company is find already, NRW’s Industry 4.0 maturity model is studied with purpose to deduce a rough outlines of Logistics 4.0 maturity model. 

Key word: logistics, Logistics 4.0, Industry 4.0, maturity model