A study to determine the effects of industry 4.0 technology components on organizational performance

Abstract

The aim of this study is to determine the effects of Industry 4.0 technology components on the organizational performance of businesses. Industry 4.0, the latest phase of the industrial revolution and one which is garnering a lot of attention, offers a number of benefits to businesses such as efficiency, speed, quality, personalised production, and reduced costs. Therefore, results which can be achieved through the initial adaptation of businesses to Industry 4.0 are among today's most compelling technological issues. In this context, the idea of determining the effects of Industry 4.0 components on businesses, specifically on their organizational performance, is the main aim of this research.As part of “Turkey's Digital Roadmap” (2018), created by the Ministry of Science, Industry, and Technology, the province of Kayseri in Turkey was investigated within the scope of the country's plans to digitize industry. The province of Kayseri, with an intensive number of businesses there using more technology, is one of Turkey's leading industrial and commercial regions. The fact that these enterprises use the latest technologies in their production processes has enabled the acquisition of the correct data for this research. Accordingly, enterprises using Industry 4.0 technologies and working on behalf of Industry 4.0 in the Kayseri Organized Industrial Zone have been determined as the main target group for this data. In this context, data was collected using face-to-face interviews, surveys, and second-hand data collection methods with executives in businesses using Industry 4.0 technologies and those adapting themselves to the process. The findings of the study reveal that Industry 4.0 technology components affect the organizational performance and this effect is positive. The findings of this study are consistent with the findings in the literature. More broadly, the findings show that Industry 4.0 technology components increase organizational performance criteria such as profitability, sales, production amount, production amount per capita, capacity utilization rate, production speed, product quality, and can lead to significant reductions in production costs. These results are encouraging for businesses wanting to transition to Industry 4.0 and are important in terms of filling in the gaps in the literature and practice. They also reinforce previous research highlighting the key role of digital technologies in value enhancement to achieve organizational performance. In this context, the scientific contribution of the research is the statistical verification of the proposed theoretical framework with production sector application.