Industry 4.0—also called the Fourth Industrial Revolution or 4IR—is the next phase in the digitization of the manufacturing sector, driven by disruptive trends including the rise of data and connectivity, analytics, human-machine interaction, and improvements in robotics.
What is Industry 4.0?
Short history.
What is Industry 1.0?
1st industrial revolution is known through introduction of mechanical production facilities with the help of water and steam power. It is recognized by first mechanical weaving loom in 1784.
What is Industry 2.0?
2nd industrial revolution is known through introduction of mass production with the help of electrical energy. It is is recognized by first assembly line in 1870.
What is Industry 3.0?
3rd industrial revolution is known through application of electronics and IT to further automate production.
It is recognized by first programmable logic control system in 1969.
What is Industry 4.0?
4th industrial revolution is known through cyber-physical production systems (CPPS), merging of real and virtual worlds.
While in some ways it's an extension of the computerization of the 3rd Industrial Revolution (Digital Revolution), due to the velocity, scope and systems impact of the changes of the fourth revolution, it is being considered a distinct era.2
The important characteristic of Industry 4.0 is cyber-physical systems that connect real worlds to virtual one in tremendous speed.
The integration of digital and physical systems can be described in physical-to-digital-to-physical (PDP) loop. PDP loop consists of:
Physical to digital: Capture information from the physical world and create a digital record from physical data.
Digital to digital: Share information and uncover meaningful insights using advanced analytics, scenario analysis, and artificial intelligence.
Digital to physical: Apply algorithms to translate digital-world decisions to effective data, to spur action and change in the physical world.
This PDP loop is the main feature of Industry 4.0.