ANDREAS SYSKA
University of Applied Sciences, Faculty of Business Administration
and Economics Mönchengladbach, Germany

Abstract

Production oft he future takes place in networks, instead of factories. The manufacturers of the future do not manufacture anything themselves, but enable their customers and third parties to do so.

Thanks to digitisation, the economies of scale does no longer apply. Therefore production is carried out in intelligent networks consisting of shopping malls, maker spaces, craft business and in private households. Production takes place in temporary networks that constantly reconfigure themselves on value creation platforms. Companies  have turned into temporally limited enterprises, that do not separate between employer and employee. With everybody being co-entrepreneur, production will have turned into general entrepreneurship.

Digitisation is probably humanity’s greatest achievement since script was invented. It has what it takes to prepare the way to create the society we have always been dreaming of. But present ideas about digitisation often are limited to speeding up the present way of doing business. That is the wrong approach, because the real potential of digitisation will not be found in the field of “faster, higher, further”. 

The hype about Industry 4.0 is over. The general feeling of breathlessness and the fear of missing out have given way to a clear view of what is achievable – and that’s a good thing. The approach adopted by most companies is pragmatic – and as a consequence, first improvements are being made. And now that Industry 4.0 is not a revolution after all, who cares about that?

This clear view opens up the opportunity to finally shape digitisation in such a way that it benefits people – and goes beyond efficiency, transparency and the pressure for growth. But isn´t that what already happens? Isn’t it the case that people are central of digitisation? Yes, that is often he ...