Setting an industry 4.0 research and development agenda for simulation – A literature review

Abstract

The fourth industrial revolution, or Industry 4.0 (I4.0), originated in German, englobes many innovative features, in order to bring the concept of “smart factories”. Moreover, discrete-event simulation (DES) is one of the most important areas involved in this goal. With this in mind, the purpose of this paper is to propose a research and development agenda (R&D) for DES researchers and practitioners, in order to comply with the I4.0 agenda. To achieve this, a literature review (LR) was conducted, in which 45 papers were considered relevant for this research. From their analysis, it was found that: the ability to automatically generate simulation models; the automation of data exchange between manufacturing applications and simulation tools; and visualization features, are the most essential DES features for I4.0. Thereafter, the LR focused on analysing the most recent papers in these areas of simulation, in order to propose a list of R&D items for DES researchers and practitioners.