The modern industry has seen great advances since its earliest iteration at the beginning of the industrial revolution in the 18th century. For centuries, most of the goods including weapons, tools, food, clothing and housing, were manufactured by hand or by using work animals. This changed in the end of the 18th century with the introduction of manufacturing processes. The progress from Industry 1.0 was then rapid uphill climb leading up to to the upcoming industrial era – Industry 4.0. Here we discuss the overview of this evolution.

Industry 1.0 The late 18th century introduced mechanical production facilities to the world. Water and steam powered machines were developed to help workers in the mass production of goods. The first weaving loom was introduced in 1784. With the increase in production efficiency and scale, small businesses grew from serving a limited number of customers to large organizations with owners, manager and employees serving a larger number. Industry 1.0 can also be deemed as the beginning of the industry culture which focused equally on quality, efficiency and scale.

Industry 2.0 The beginning of 20th century marked the start of the second industrial revolution – Industry 2.0. The main contributor to this revolution was the development of machines running on electrical energy. Electrical energy was already being used as a primary source of power. Electrical ma- chines were more efficient to operate and maintain, both in terms of cost and effort unlike the water and steam based machines which were comparatively inefficient and resource hungry. The first assembly line was also built during this era, further streamlining the process of mass production. Mass production of goods using assembly line became a standard practice.

This era also saw the evolution of the industry culture introduced in Industry 1.0 into management program to enhance the efficiency of manufacturing facilities. Various production management techniques such as division of labor, just-in-time manufacturing and lean manufacturing principles refined the underlying processes leading to improved quality and output. American mechanical engineer Fredrick Taylor introduced the study of approached to optimize worker, workplace techniques and optimal allocation of resources.

Industry 3.0 The next industrial revolution resulting in Industry 3.0 was brought about and spurred by the advances in the electronics industry in the last few decades of the 20th century. The invention and manufacturing of a variety electronic devices including transistor and integrated circuits auto- mated the machines substantially which resulted in reduced effort ,increased speed, greater accuracy and even complete replacement of the human agent in some cases. Programmable Logic Controller (PLC), which was first built in 1960s was one of the landmark invention that signified automation using electronics. The integration of electronics hardware into the manufacturing systems also created a requirement of software systems to enable these electronic devices, consequentially fueling the software development market as well. Apart from controlling the hardware, the software systems also enabled many management processes such as enterprise resource planning, inventory management, shipping logistics, product flow scheduling and tracking throughout the factory. The entire industry was further automated using electronics and IT. The automation processes and software systems have continuously evolved with the advances in the electronics and IT industry since then. The pressure to further reduce costs forced many manufacturers to move to low-cost countries. The dispersion of geographical location of manufacturing led to the formation of the concept of Supply Chain Management.

Industry 4.0 The boom in the Internet and telecommunication industry in the 1990’s revolutionized the way we connected and exchanged information. It also resulted in paradigm changes in the manufacturing industry and traditional production operations merging the boundaries of the physical and the virtual world. Cyber Physical Systems (CPSs) have further blurred this boundary resulting in numerous rapid technological disruptions in the industry. CPSs allow the machines to communicate more intelligently with each other with almost no physical or geographical barriers.

The Industry 4.0 using Cyber Physical Systems to share, analyze and guide intelligent actions for various processes in the industry to make the machines smarter. These smart machines can continuously monitor,detect and predict faults to suggest preventive measures and remedial action. This allows better preparedness and lower downtime for industries. The same dynamic approach can be translated to other aspects in the industry such as logistics, production scheduling, optimization of throughput times, quality control, capacity utilization and efficiency boosting. CPPs also allow an industry to be completely virtually visualized, monitored and managed from a remote location and thus adding a new dimension to the manufacturing process. It puts machines,people, processes and infrastructure into a single networked loop making the overall management highly efficient.

As the technology-cost curve becomes steeper everyday, more and more rapid technology disruptions will emerge at even lower costs and revolutionize the industrial ecosystem. Industry 4.0 is still at a nascent stage and the industries are still in the transition state of adoption of the new systems.Industries must adopt the new systems as fast as possible to stay relevant and profitable. Industry 4.0 is here and it is here to stay, at least for the next decade.