International Scientific Journals
of Scientific Technical Union of Mechanical Engineering "Industry 4.0"

The intensity of technology development that we have witnessed in recent years has changed the expectations and attitudes of customers, as well as their understanding of value, and is becoming the new leading factor in the development of the industry. A retrospective of industrial production shows that all stages of change and development that it has gone through are stimulated precisely by the desire to meet the demand, expectations and needs of customers. In this sense, industrial enterprises around the world are clearly aware of the need for change. They should review their current production and sales strategies and focus their attention and efforts on building dynamic production models that will allow them to continue to operate successfully in a highly competitive market environment and changing customer requirements. Digitalization plays a key role in this new scenario in which industrial enterprises must fit in today. Digital technologies and the opportunities they create are the main driving force for the necessary radical change, which companies must rely on in order to increase their efficiency and, respectively, to maintain their competitiveness. This publication presents a conceptual model for assessing the digital maturity of the production system of the industrial enterprise.

This publication addresses the factors that support the process of developing an individual approach to customers, which is one of the main tasks of the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution or Industry 4.0. The emphasis is on the study of the interrelationships and the interaction between these factors and their integration in a structured way, with the help of the so-called Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) to help integrate them into a comprehensive conceptual framework that represents producer-customer interactions under Industry 4.0 conditions and, as a result, increase the efficiency of the process of creating value according to the individual requirements and expectations of the customer.

Nowadays, the dynamics of technologies development, as well as continuously growing customers‟ requirements, put industrial enterprises from around the world before the necessity of rethinking old strategies and building new dynamic business models, in order to successfully continue operating in today‟s conditions of a highly competent market environment. The digitalization takes a key position in this new scenario, where modern industrial enterprises should fit. Digital technologies, as well as the opportunities they create, are the main moving power, which enterprises should stake upon, to successfully raise their own efficiency. One of the biggest threats caused by the digital transformation of operations is for the people to be replaced by the machines. The present paper offers a conceptual framework of a methodology for investigating the role of human factor in a digital manufacturing environment.