Digital Manufacturing Platforms in the Industry 4.0 from Private and Public Perspectives

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The aim of the paper is review the concepts and approaches related to digital manufacturing platforms from different perspectives: IoT platforms, Digital manufacturing platforms, Digital platforms as ecosystems, Digital platforms from R&D perspective and Digital platform from industrial equipment suppliers.

This is a actual and interesting topic that the authors have done very well. As this is a review, a more detailed analysis could be carried out.

I would focus on fewer areas and do a more detailed analysis. In the title there is a past, present and future challenges - the authors should develop future challenges.

Author Response

First of all, thank you for your review and feedback.

To understand better the reason of the structure and level of detail of the different sections it is important to remark that the organization the corresponding author and other 2 coauthors belong to is a research center in manufacturing technologies, IDEKO, that is part of the leading machine tool builder company in Spain, DANOBATGROUP. In our industrial group there is also a technology based company named SAVVY DATA SYSTEMS that provides a digital manufacturing platform to monitor and optimize the operation and production of our machines. Moreover, about 20% of the budget of IDEKO comes from EU R&D calls, so we are active contributors defining the Research and Innovation agendas of the different PPPs related to manufacturing. This is the main reason of the multifaceted approach presented in this paper. We represent a stakeholder who define, design, develop and build digital manufacturing platforms from an industry and research/academia perspective with a global vision about strategy and competitors. We think that the main contribution of the review paper is that the approach comes from an end to end digital platform provider that handles and combines industry and research requirements.

Under these premises we considered that a balanced detail level of the selected sections is the structure that fits the best with our message and contribution.

Regarding conclusions we have added the biggest challenges from our point of view following your recommendations.

We are willing to continue iterating over the paper once you know better our point of view and approach.

Regards,

Jon Kepa Gerrikagoitia, PhD

Reviewer 2 Report

I would like to thank the editor for the invitation to review this paper.

The paper topic is quite modern and interesting. There are some important suggestions to improve the paper:

Abstract is quite general without clear aim, methodology and study results presentation.

The industry 4.0 definition presented in the introduction is very narrow, I cannot agree that it is “collective term for technologies and concepts of value chain organization” it must be extended. Moreover I suggest to divide the Introduction into two sections: “Introduction” and “Literature review”.
Extending literature review please consider some more sources from special issue published by mdpi related to the Industry 4.0

https://www.mdpi.com/journal/socsci/special_issues/Industry_4.0_Implication

Ślusarczyk, B. (2018). Industry 4.0 – Are we ready? Polish Journal of Management Studies, 17 (1), pp. 232-248.

The paper should present methodology and the results description as well as study results discussion in relation to previous studies.

The conclusion is also narrow – add recommendation, some study results limits and future study discussion

Author Response

Thank you for your review and suggestions.

The industry 4.0 definition has been extended in the text and adding 2 more references as well. Reference [1] includes a table with 12 definitions of industry 4.0 and our definition or statement tries to sum up the common features of all of them.

The methodology is not explicitly explained. In this sense it is important to remark that the organization the corresponding author and other 2 coauthors belong to is a research center in manufacturing technologies, IDEKO, that is part of the leading machine tool builder company in Spain, DANOBATGROUP. In our industrial group there is also a technology based company named SAVVY DATA SYSTEMS that provides a digital manufacturing platform to monitor and optimize the operation and production of our machines. Moreover, about 20% of the budget of IDEKO comes from EU R&D calls, so we are active contributors defining the Research and Innovation agendas of the different PPPs related to manufacturing. This is the main reason of the multifaceted approach presented in this paper.We represent a stakeholder who define, design, develop and build digital manufacturing platforms from an industry and research/academia perspective with a global vision about strategy and competitors. We may add this explanation in the introduction if you consider or even create a new Methodology section. We think that the main contribution of the review paper is that the approach comes from an end to end digital platform provider that handles and combines industry and research requirements.

Regarding the split of introduction and literature review, once the new references have been added we think it can be sufficient because the structure of the paper and the most of the points that are covered (IoT, Digital Platforms, Industry providers, ecosystems…) do not have a directly focused relevant literature so far. There are very interesting paper compilations regarding industry 4.0 like the one you have suggested but in an specific point we may loose some focus. Nevertheless, I you are not convinced with our explanation we can split and enrich the point.

Regarding conclusions we have added the biggest challenges from our pint of view following your recommendations.

We are willing to continue iterating over the paper once you know better our point of view and approach.

Best regards

Jon Kepa Gerrikagoitia PhD

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Editor, in my opinion the authors have considered the reviewer’s suggestions very cursorily.

I suggest deeper changes and highlighting in the manuscript all the improvements. Another way the reviewer’s work is redundant

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

We will include the changes and updload the document following your suggestions not later than next Friday.

Thank you ver much