Due to increasing product complexity and numerous suppliers, CAD-based co-design is becoming increasingly important. However, cross-company collaboration via email, cloud services, or centralized platforms raises issues around data sovereignty, transparency, efficiency, and security. Data space technology, seems to be a promising solution for the secure exchange of sensitive data with partners across company boundaries. However, in the field of industrial co-design, specific requirements must be considered for future data space applications. During the collaborative development of a product involving 12 organisations, a focus group was formed to identify current challenges in cross-company collaboration and derive requirements. These were assessed qualitatively and quantitatively using a mixed methods approach. Six key requirements were identified, highlighting the need for structured workflows, fine-grained access control, and flexible integration. These findings provide concrete design guidance for future data space solutions.

End-to-End PeopleSoft Inbound File Automation Framework is a solution to the enterprise-wide requirement to process a variety of inbound files across various business divisions and company boundaries. Using GoAnywhere to transfer files securely, Control-M to coordinate workflows, and the intrinsic capabilities of PeopleSoft, the infrastructure allows entirely automated processing on data in real-time, without human intervention. Its architecture is designed with high-quality error management and contextual reporting and governance controls, as well as operational transparency and compliance. Processing can be configured to give business users flexibility, and there are embedded technical guardrails to enforce system integrity. Data validation across multiple layers ensures that low-quality data does not flow into the enterprise systems and improves both accuracy and reliability. Integrated reporting ensures that stakeholders have real-time access to performance metrics, which can be used to provide actionable information about organizational activity. This business-tier solution brings large scale value in operation efficiency, data quality, agility, and regulatory compliance and is especially effective in large integration environments with diverse file processing needs.

Abstract The mining industry remains a high-risk sector where safety management is increasingly complicated by outsourcing and multi-employer arrangements. This paper explores how formal safety management is organized and practiced across company boundaries in the Swedish mining industry. Drawing on qualitative data from a research project focusing on workshops, company meetings, and industry-level discussions, the study examines how client companies, contractors, and the national trade association have sought to address safety-related challenges arising in contractor-dominated worksites. Findings reveal that outsourcing has introduced fragmentation, unclear responsibilities, and coordination difficulties, often exacerbated by asymmetrical power relations between clients and contractors. In response, companies and the industry association have implemented formal measures aimed at clarifying legal duties, codifying routines, and supporting key boundary-spanning roles, such as operative coordinators. While these efforts strengthen procedural clarity and accountability, the study also cautions that formalization may inadvertently increase inter-organizational distance and reduce trust, particularly when monitoring overshadows collaboration. The paper contributes to the literature on occupational health and safety management by showing how regulatory intent and operational practice diverge in complex organizational environments. It highlights the tensions between formal control and practical cooperation in outsourced safety management, suggesting that effective coordination requires more than legal clarity alone. The findings are particularly relevant for practitioners, regulators, and researchers concerned with contractor safety, coordination, and the institutional foundations of responsibility in multi-employer settings.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) have become vital tools in industrial sectors such as coal mining for site inspections and operational monitoring. However, unauthorized UAV flights present security risks that necessitate forensic investigation. This study examines a forensic case involving a DJI Mini 3 UAV suspected of crossing company boundaries. Using the Conceptual Digital Forensics Model for the Drone Forensic Field, both static and dynamic forensic acquisition methods were applied. Static acquisition recovered 53 photographs, 11 videos, 11 audio files, 10 deleted photos, 4 deleted videos, and 3 unidentified log files. Dynamic acquisition yielded 64 media files including 63 photographs (.JPG and .jpg) with 10 deleted, 14 videos (.MP4, .MOV, .SWF) with 6 deleted, 11 audio files, 4 plain text files, 31 deleted files, 3 EXIF metadata records containing GPS coordinates, and 3 unidentified log files. The GPS data from EXIF metadata was visualized in Google Earth to map flight paths and confirm boundary violations. These findings demonstrate that dynamic acquisition retrieves a more comprehensive artifact set than static acquisition. This study highlights the importance of UAV digital forensics in supporting security investigations and ensuring compliance with industrial UAV policies.

This is the seventh special issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability. As the first special issue on the topic was issued in 2009, the topic has a fifteen-year history in this journal. Environmental sustainability was recognized as important for manufacturing even at that time, which is why the special issue was started in this journal. The seriousness of this topic has been increasing not only in Europe but also in Japan and other countries. A recent critical trend has been the way in which companies’ attitudes toward this issue, including their positions on carbon neutrality, a circular economy, and biodiversity, determine their value. Furthermore, particularly striking trend is the promotion of various policies to realize a circular economy, including the adoption of international standards for a circular economy and new eco-design regulations in Europe. These movements indicate the need to transform production and consumption in society as a whole beyond the boundaries of individual companies and industries. The seventh special issue contains seven well-written papers. The papers cover the following topics: - Circular economy - Life cycle design and management - Environmentally conscious design of products and services - Low-energy and low-emission manufacturing - Closed-loop supply chain management - Sustainable consumption and production From the fifteen-year history of this special issue, we have been able to learn viewpoints specific to the series in this journal. Most of the papers, revised and enhanced in response to the editor’s invitation, were originally presented at EcoDesign 2023, the 13th International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing, held in Nara, Japan. The editor sincerely thanks the authors and reviewers for their contributions in making this special issue possible. We hope that these articles encourage further research on design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability.

Companies are turning to ideation contests to engage ideators outside company boundaries to solve their complex problems. Our research focusses on how articulating the problem, specifically the number and type of constraints described within the problem statement (brief), is related to the number of ideas submitted by participants in ideation contests. Specifically, we find that participant engagement, in terms of ideas submitted, varies with three different types of constraints—input, process and output. Contributions to the creativity literature as well as managerial implications are discussed.

This paper considers the current problems of knowledge and information systems management, which are solved with the help of digital institutes for the purpose of the development of high-tech production in the conditions of Industry 4.0. The paper identifies the role of knowledge in the innovative development of industrial production, characterises the specifics of the influence of digital technologies on the technological development of companies and production processes, and focuses on the sensitivity of high-tech production to the level of intellectual support of production processes. Emphasis is made on the necessity of using comprehensive digital institutes, which can expand the boundaries of production companies and use the potential of digital platforms and systems in full. The research methodology combines traditional and new scientific directions and institutional theories in disciplines that study the research problem in the context of an increase in the intellectualisation of labour in the conditions of Industry 4.0. The research methodology covers general scientific methods of synthesis, analysis, the monographic method, observation, generalisation, and comparison. The paper contains important thoughts regarding the features of digital institutes from the position of their formation and influence on knowledge management in high-tech companies. It considers the structure and functions of the digital institutes of knowledge and information systems management in the conditions of Industry 4.0 and characterises selected institutes in the context of their influence on the digital transformation of the economy and the improvement of the state of knowledge management.

In the age of digital transformation, the boundaries of companies are beginning to blur. In the information society, the network economy is emerging as a new, paradigmatic economic order. With the ability to share information quickly and cheaply on a global scale, the importance of centralised decision-making and costly corporate structures is diminishing. Companies are giving way to interconnected networks, and the concept of ownership is gradually being replaced by the concept of access rights. From a company law perspective, this shift to the network economy leads to the emergence of new forms of governance. As access rights replace ownership, the governance of these rights becomes paramount for economic actors, but it transcends company boundaries and is instead rooted in contractual relationships. As a result, contract governance is gradually replacing corporate governance. With governance frameworks extending beyond the firm to contractual networks, directors’ duties are likely to extend beyond firm-specific boundaries to bridge the responsibility gap created by the increasing use of data technologies.

Abstract Research Summary We develop new theory on incumbent firms' strategic decision‐making and the associated emotional dynamics at platform transitions. Based on in‐depth interviews with Nokia's senior leaders about their decision to adopt the Windows platform in 2011, we suggest that highly capable platform companies' entry into the established phone industry invalidated senior leaders' long‐held core assumptions about the industry, triggering existential anxiety and stunting self‐regulation. Distinct mechanisms then influenced senior leaders' emotions toward external platform options—myopic appraisals of firm competitiveness inside a platform (vs. platform competitiveness against other platforms), appraisals of changing firm boundaries, and emotional resonance of potential partners. These emotions contributed to emotional drift, with top managers ultimately favoring the emotionally attractive option. Our theorizing extends theory on platforms, strategy, and emotion. Managerial Summary This research provides fresh insights into how emotions play a crucial role in incumbent firms' strategic choices, especially in the context of evolving technology platforms and major industry shifts. Our research focused on Nokia's 2011 decision to adopt the Windows platform. We discovered that when new players, like platform companies, enter a market, they can unsettle longstanding beliefs, causing anxiety and decision‐making challenges among top management. Specifically, we found that executives often focus too narrowly on their firm's ability to compete within a new platform rather than the platform's overall competitiveness. Additionally, changes in company boundaries and the emotional appeal of potential partners significantly influence these decisions. Executives' analyses emotionally drift such that they start favoring the emotionally attractive options.

Value stream mapping for sustainability: A management tool proposal for more sustainable companies

Industry 4.0 (i4.0) is central to advanced manufacturing. Building on novel digital technologies, it enables smart and flexible manufacturing with systems connected across company boundaries and product lifecycle phases. Despite its benefits, the adoption of i4.0 has been limited, especially in small and medium-sized enterprises. A key challenge is the technological complexity of i4.0. While advanced functionality requires technological complexity, it complicates an understanding of which enabling technologies are particularly useful and required. This article presents a framework to support successful i4.0 adoption across the entire product generation process through a systematic matrix-based dependency analysis of i4.0 solutions and underlying i4.0 technologies. Through increasing transparency around technological complexity of i4.0 solutions, this research contributes to a better understanding of which technologies are required for specific i4.0 solutions and which technologies could be strategic enablers for a broad variety of i4.0 applications. Knowing these technological dependencies supports both, the systematic adoption of existing i4.0 solutions and the development of new i4.0 solutions. This also sets the basis for a future socio-technical investigation.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are a decisive part of the efforts against climate change. However, they are late in terms of sustainability and circular economy (CE). Little is known about the factors that facilitate the implementation of CE practices in SMEs. Due to CE leading to cost savings, new business models or reputation gains, companies can achieve a competitive advantage. To realize this competitive advantage the strategic orientation of a firm is pointed out. Various theoretical papers have shown how CE can be enabled and how it can be inhibited. However, empirical studies that support the existing literature are lacking. The goal of this paper is to investigate the influence of two mechanisms, namely commitment to sustainability (CtS) and digitalization as strategic orientations on CE implementation. Therefore, we conduct a study with a self-developed sample of 754 German SMEs. Using multiple linear regression analyses, the results show that digitalization and CtS positively influence CE implementation in SMEs. Interestingly, the complementary effect of pursuing a dual strategy toward digitalization and sustainability is not significant for CE implementation. Our study contributes to the CE literature by giving a nuanced understanding of various antecedents of CE implementation. This study provides several approaches for managers of SMEs to improve their CE practices. First, digitalization is indeed an effective tool for implementing CE practices. Therefore, practitioners should strengthen their digitalization efforts when considering increased CE implementation. Second, a general focus on sustainability increases the implementation of CE practices. Therefore, practitioners should raise awareness of sustainability throughout the organization. Third, the combined focus on CtS and digitalization needs to be carefully considered. To implement CE, digitalization should be embedded in the sustainability strategy. Due to the liability of smallness, SMEs should seek their resources for digitalization and sustainability commitment not only within but also outside the company boundaries.

Manufacturing-X represents the idea of a decentralized data economy. The aim is to increase sustainability, competitiveness and resilience by digitizing supply chains. Technically, this requires three technologies. First, a standardized data model to ensure interoperability across company boundaries. Second, a solution to realize sovereign inter-organizational data exchange. And thirdly, a component for the company’s internal data communication. Asset Administration Shell (AAS), Eclipse Dataspace Connector (EDSC) and Open Platform Communication Unified Architecture (OPC UA) are suitable solutions. This paper introduces an appropriate architecture to combine these technologies in an industrial production environment and discusses existing challenges, limitations and future potentials.

The purpose of the research is to study certain aspects of transformation of corporate relations and corporate law, in the light of blurring of company boundaries and development of digital communications and startup culture. The results and conclusions are obtained based on general scientific and private scientific methods of research. Research studies examples of quasi-corporate and quasi-public structures created through (1) deferred share transfer agreements (SAFE), (2) crowdfunding agreements, (3) public market intermediary companies (SPAC), (4) exchanges for private companies. With the emergence of cross-border hybrid corporate structures at intersection of debt and equity, public and private financing, the current debates on the objectives of corporate law and the purpose of the corporation acquire a new perspective, as the very boundaries of the corporation become fluid. At the same time, decision-making procedures are mediated by third parties and digital technologies, with the prospect of conflict of interest, and are regulated, among other things, by standards emerging so to say from below. In the digital era, flexibility in the choice of elements of the structure allows to detach from the current state corporate regulation and attach to it in the right place and at the right time. It is concluded that the explosive growth of hybrid structures forms new areas of development of legal regulation by rejecting the dichotomy of soft and hard law. Among the vectors of transformation, the growing importance of private law unifications, the development of theoretical apparatus based on the concept of transnational law, the emergence of its subsystems, including lex corporatoria are noted. Among the tasks of lex corporatoria the formation of standards and customs in the field of corporate finance is also postulated as a regulatory framework for functioning of the hybrid structures under study.

The important challenge of the digital economy from a business management perspective, in the context of digital transformation, is the development of digital platforms and the formation of innovative business ecosystems based on them. These ecosystems not only change the ways of organizing and conducting economic and labor activities but also disrupt existing production business models. The application of an ecosystem approach contributes to a comprehensive analysis of the development of an innovative business ecosystem, including the evaluation of infrastructure, new forms of relationships, and economic interests of stakeholders within the digital transformation of the economy, scientific and production cooperation, especially in the conditions of the high-tech and intellectual services market, as well as the processes of creating, accumulating, and transmitting new knowledge. In this context, platforms become a kind of "building blocks" of the digital economy, as they "attract" external resources, investments, and innovations from other companies to develop complementary products and services. The paper explores aspects of the phenomenon of «platformization» related to the widespread use of digital platforms as new business models. The digitization of all areas of life in an information-networked society is a mandatory attribute of the social and economic development of the country and its regions. The processes of active implementation of digital technologies, new for sustainable economic growth of states, represent new factors for ensuring leadership and competitiveness in the global market, and, most importantly, create conditions for effective interaction of innovation-active participants based on partnership relations, shaping an innovative business ecosystem. The main conditions for the emergence of platforms at the boundaries of companies forming a business ecosystem, a dynamically developed community of actors creating new values through both interaction and competition, are discussed in the paper. The paper presents the process of information exchange among participants in the digital platform within the innovative business ecosystem. The technological and compositional capabilities of the digital platform transform them into a format of innovative development, ensuring quick adaptation to changes in business conditions. The paper proposes a methodological approach to monitoring global trends in digitization, based on identified mature, sectoral, breakthrough, cross-cutting, and technological trends, as well as business trends. The authors suggest an algorithm for implementing the main stages of the procedure for monitoring global trends in digitization and platformization. A methodology for assessing the level of digital maturity is proposed based on determining the level of development of digitization and platformization of the innovative business ecosystem. The authors of this work propose a conceptual methodological model for the formation of an innovative business ecosystem. The paper presents a basic algorithm for calculating the economic effect and efficiency of implementing a digital platform. Recommendations for improving ecosystem management in the conditions of economic platformization are also provided.

The safe-UR-chain project is focused on the tamper-proof storage of production-related data and its exchange across company boundaries. The system is based on 'entangled' blockchains, i.e., each company maintains its own blockchain and sporadically integrates block hashes from the blockchains of other companies into it. This makes it possible, to verify the existence and integrity of data from another company’s blockchain later. To prove that the data has not been tampered with, an efficient cryptographic accumulator is used. This accumulator makes it possible to show, that a block is included at a certain position within a blockchain. Based on this proof, the existence and integrity of data in another company’s blockchain can be verified.

The global spread of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has put an enormous pressure on human societies, at both health and economic levels. Early diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent of 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19), has proved an efficient method to rapidly isolate positive individuals and reduce transmission rates, thus alleviating its negative impact on society’s well-being and economic growth. In this work, through a coordinated and centralized effort to monitor SARS-CoV-2 circulation in companies from the State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, we have detected and linked an early rise of infection rates in January 2022 to the introduction of the Omicron variant of concern (VoC) (BA.1). Interestingly, when the Omicron genomic isolates were compared to correlates from public datasets, it was revealed that introduction events were multiple, with possible migration routes mapping to: Mali; Oman and United States; and Italy, Latin America, and United States. In addition, we have built a haplotype network with our genomic dataset and found no strong evidence of transmission chains, between and within companies. Considering Omicron’s particularly high transmissibility, and that most of our samples (>87%) arose from 3 out of 10 companies, these findings suggest that workers from such environments were exposed to SARS-CoV-2 outside their company boundaries. Thus, using a mixed strategy in which quick molecular diagnosis finds support in comprehensive genomic analysis, we have shown that a successfully implemented occupational health program should contribute to document emerging VoC and to limit the spread of SARS-CoV-2 at the workplace.

The Industrial Internet-of-Things (IIoT) promises significant improvements for the manufacturing industry by facilitating the integration of manufacturing systems by Digital Twins. However, ecological and economic demands also require a cross-domain linkage of multiple scientific perspectives from material sciences, engineering, operations, business, and ergonomics, as optimization opportunities can be derived from any of these perspectives. To extend the IIoT to a trueInternet of Production, two concepts are required: first, a complex, interrelated network of Digital Shadows which combine domain-specific models with data-driven AI methods; and second, the integration of a large number of research labs, engineering, and production sites as a World Wide Lab which offers controlled exchange of selected, innovation-relevant data even across company boundaries. In this article, we define the underlying Computer Science challenges implied by these novel concepts in four layers:Smart human interfacesprovide access to information that has been generated bymodel-integrated AI. Given the large variety of manufacturing data, newdata modelingtechniques should enable efficient management of Digital Shadows, which is supported by aninterconnected infrastructure. Based on a detailed analysis of these challenges, we derive a systematized research roadmap to make the vision of the Internet of Production a reality.

This paper reports on the experiences of working with new digital tools along with the experience of new remote work. We explore the emotional experiences of working from home during the first three months of the COVID-19 pandemic and their implications. There were two groups of respondents participating in the study, those who had experience working remotely before the pandemic [digital natives] and those who started working remotely during the pandemic [digital immigrants]. The results show that emotional experiences while working from home do not differ depending on the profession, age, gender, length of experience and from previous remote work. This suggests that the digital natives had to deal with the same emotions as the digital immigrants. The study found that independent external changes determine the growth of competence in employees, in this particular case, to work remotely. Working in conditions that are difficult for everyone obliges employees to cooperate, even across company boundaries, and increases each other’s competencies. In such situations, the management is required to be emotionally involved and closer to the employee.

In production networks, production must run efficiently across company boundaries. Companies must be able to react quickly as a single unit. Two trends are influencing this situation: On the one hand, the progressing servitization leads to the increased offering of digital services in the field of manufacturing. From the literature, it is known that digital services let manufacturers, suppliers, and industrial customers interact more closely and frequently in a production network. On the other hand, the concept of the digital twin is trending. It promises the real-time prognosis and control of production systems. Although the concept of the digital twin itself can be vague there are some technologies trying to implement the digital twin of production. The asset administration shell (AAS) is an example of such a technology that draws growing attention. Picking up the initial situation these two trends could be used to create a feedback loop between the production system and network and thus improve the overall efficiency in production networks. Based on this idea, the paper first presents an approach to model systematically a possibility for a feedback loop orienting to the business model concept. Second, a reference architecture is derived from the RAMI 4.0 standard. The specified reference architecture is the basis for the specific implementation. Third, a procedure is developed to implement a specific architecture. For implementing an architecture, the usage of the asset administration shell is assumed. Finally, the approach is validated in a use case from the high precision weight industry.