The report identifies specific areas of action for businesses and policymakers, focusing on uniform regulatory frameworks, the development of circular business models, and the coordination of complex, data-based value creation networks.
Four areas of action identified
In detail, the report identifies four key areas that set the course for the industry:
1. Zero consumption: All resources are completely recycled in line with a “total circular economy,” even against the backdrop of high uncertainty in procurement markets. Future viability value creation is achieved through circular principles and business models that focus on reuse rather than waste.
2. Customer-centric ecosystems: Manufacturing companies orchestrate customer ecosystems, thereby becoming catalysts for customer innovation. Industry needs clear, innovation-friendly standards, competitiveness-friendly framework conditions, and a culture of openness, as well as appropriate education for specialists, in order to produce world-leading products.
3. Data and AI as a foundation: The data and application landscape will be fully automated. AI and Digital Twins will enable natural language interaction with corporate knowledge via autonomously operating technologies.
4. Role of humans: Humans will be able to interact intuitively and in dynamically changing roles with autonomously operating technology.
Prof. Dr. Boris Otto, Project Manager and Director of the Fraunhofer ISST, emphasizes the importance of industry actively shaping the future:
“What is special is that companies want to act proactively in the value creation system of the future and orchestrate customer ecosystems in order to bring products produced with sustainability to market. Applied science must contribute the technologies and framework conditions for tomorrow's ESG criteria and other regulations so that they can develop this self-efficacy.”
Prof. Dr. Katharina Hölzle, Director of the Fraunhofer IAO, adds:
“The future of industrial value creation systems requires a clever balancing act between technological innovation, sustainability of resources, and a modern corporate culture. Only through interdisciplinary cooperation, targeted skills development, and openness to new ways of thinking will it be possible to actively shape change and secure the long-term competitiveness of German industry.”
Fraunhofer Institute for Software and Systems Engineering