Sustainability impact of digitization in logistics

Abstract

Today, most enterprises are undergoing a digitization process with the fourth industrial revolution, named industry 4.0. The focus of the digital transformation lies mainly on production, therefore the terms such as "Factory of the Future" or "Smart Factory" are used similar with this concept. However, there are many reasons for considering the impact of digitalization in logistics and the importance of supply chain for industry 4.0. The key promises of this concept are enabling real-time full-transparency from suppliers to customers, small lot sizes, multiple product variants, connected processes and decentralized, autonomous management. These benefits cannot be achieved by production alone, but only along the entire supply chain. Moreover, logistics should gain a greater vision to fulfill the requirements of industry 4.0 as sustainably as possible in terms of using appropriate technologies and enhancing vertical and horizontal integration among the supply chain partners. In this respect, this study highlights the benefits of the digitization of logistics process and examines the sustainability impact of digitization in logistics. The study is pursued as a single case study within the FMCG companies and their transport service providers in Turkey and it is based on a qualitative method and on connected semi-structured interviews. (C) 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 15th Global Conference on Sustainable Manufacturing (GCSM).