Brief Overview of Collaborative Approaches in Sustainable Manufacturing

The manufacturing sector is experiencing a profound transformation as reflected in the Industry 4.0 movement, combined with the growing societal concerns for sustainability. This trend has led to the notion of sustainable manufacturing. On the other hand, the increasing interconnectivity among organisations, people, and physical systems, supported by recent developments in communication technologies, points to the important role that collaborative networks have in the ongoing digital transformation processes. As such, this paper analyses the synergies between sustainable manufacturing and collaborative networks. More specifically, the goal is to analyse how the responsibility for the various facets of sustainability can be distributed among the multiple entities involved in manufacturing. This study is based on both literature survey and our experience in various research projects in the area and is organised according to the typical six dimensions of Industry 4.0. The work is complemented with a brief summary of proposed indicators to measure sustainability under this networked manufacturing perspective.