The Role of Open Innovation and Value Co-creation in the Challenging Transition from Industry 4.0 to Society 5.0: Toward a Theoretical Framework

Barbara Aquilani,Michela Piccarozzi,Tindara Abbate,Anna Codini

doi:10.3390/su12218943

Barbara Aquilani, Michela Piccarozzi + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/su12218943

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Abstract

Advanced manufacturing solutions, augmented reality, and cloud and big data are technologies pertaining to Industry 4.0. These technologies improve working conditions, create new business models, and increase both productivity and firm quality production. However, they can also improve life and society as a whole. This new perspective, oriented toward social and global well-being, is called Society 5.0. As has happened for all past industrial revolutions, Industry 4.0 will support the transition to a different society, i.e., Society 5.0. In this transition, open innovation and value co-creation can play an important role. The aim of the study was twofold: to examine how Industry 4.0 features and enabling technologies can support the transition to Society 5.0 and to investigate the roles of both open innovation and value co-creation within this transition. A conceptual framework was developed to jointly consider for the first time Industry 4.0, Society 5.0, open innovation, and value co-creation, which are all challenging issues that firms must cope with nowadays. Managers could profit from these insights to design ad hoc strategies in order to benefit from the opportunities emerging from this transition and overcome the main related challenges.

Highlights

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, called “Industry 4.0,” has recently become a relevant phenomenon and one of the most internationally prominent topics in both industry and academia today [1,2,3,4]
Despite the opportunities originating from digitalization at each stage of the production and service systems, the management side of Industry 4.0 has not yet been studied in depth and its definition remains ambiguous, even if it has already been stated that Industry 4.0 must be considered as “the result of a purposely formulated strategy implemented over time” [4] (p. 16)
To explore the above-mentioned issues, this study examined the main contributions toward this transition, with a focus on Industry 4.0, the transition from Industry 4.0 to Society 5.0, the role of open innovation (OI) and value co-creation in this transition and big data, assuming a managerial perspective

Summary

Introduction

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, called “Industry 4.0,” has recently become a relevant phenomenon and one of the most internationally prominent topics in both industry and academia today [1,2,3,4]. Industry 4.0 can be understood as the combination of physical and digital technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), cloud computing, big data, adaptive robotics, augmented reality, additive manufacturing, and the Internet of things (IoT) [3] It can be considered the core and the result of digital transformation in firms, especially in manufacturing activities [5]. Society 5.0 was proposed as the desired future society of Japan in the Fifth Science and Technology Basic Plan, where it “follows the hunting society (Society 1.0), agricultural society (Society 2.0), industrial society (Society 3.0), and information society (Society 4.0)” [11] This “social reform,” as can be read in the same document, “will achieve a forward-looking society that breaks down the existing sense of stagnation, a society whose members have mutual respect for each other, transcending generations, and a society in which each and every person can lead an active and enjoyable life” [11]. It is clear that Industry 4.0 can greatly support the transition to Society 5.0, a society with sustainability at its core, thanks to its features and enabling technologies (i.e., big data, AI and IoT)

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