Evaluating Manufacturers’ Smart Readiness and Maturity Exploiting Lean Product Development Approach

Manufacturers need to address Industry 4.0 to enhance their competitiveness on the market supported by the gradual adoption of digital technologies. However, devoting investments to these technologies should first be coupled by the need to gauge both their own digital status quo and the mechanisms grounding their support to perform product development process. In this context, the importance of lean approach, leading under a continuous improvement and value focused perspective how the process of product development is organized and managed throughout the functions involved, is paramount and strategic. Methods and maturity models have been introduced in the extant literature to evaluate the readiness and maturity of either their digital level or their design and engineering process. A coalescence of these tools still needs to be employed to evaluate a company under the twofold level of lean and digital: to do this, a case study has been implemented.