Projects

A Study on How Organizations Approach to Synergize Lean and Industry 4.0
Mr. C.P. Kodippili & Mr. R.D. Karunanayake Dr. Prasanna Illankoon
Mr. C.P Kodippili
Mr. R.D. Karunanayake

Over the last few decades, the advent of lean spread over most manufacturing industries as a best practice for minimizing waste, increasing efficiency, and maximizing resource usage. However, during the recent past, Industry 4.0 has proved to be a new disruptive transition taking over the existing best practices of the manufacturing industry as digitized production systems. This has sparked concern as to how these changes would affect the well-established lean systems. Hence, through this research, we explore how lean would transition into the digital era in the apparel industry considering many sub-elements of the two concepts. The paper gives a deep understanding of how Lean and Industry 4.0 can be leveraged in a mutually beneficial manner as well as the potential disruptions that may occur during this transition. The paper discusses key elements of synergy as well as disparities under different segments of both Industry 4.0 and Lean in the form of a comprehensive matrix. It also reflects the nature of synergy relationships compared against different levels of Industry 4.0 maturity.