Improving the Level of Sustainable Development in Industry 4.0 Context: A New Approach

Purpose: Sustainable manufacturing models are currently being sought, the implications of which in manufacturing companies will be an integral part of their functioning in the Industry 4.0 (I4.0) concept. This paper aims to review the application of Multi-Criteria Decision-Making methods (MCDM) to assess the Sustainable Development (SD) level in industries and build a new approach to maintain and increase SD in a company. Design/Methodology/Approach: The research methodology is based on the detailed literature studies of SD in manufacturing, applying MCDM methods and the use of an Information Technology (IT) in the I4.0 within a manufacturing company. Findings: The overview of the related works allowed for the identification of the novel approach to SD assessment and measurement in manufacturing enterprises, which integrates the SD level assessment and an IT in the I4.0 and allows to determinate the essential SD objectives for evaluation and monitoring within an enterprise using the Fuzzy Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (F-TOPSIS) method and Intuitionistic Fuzzy Weighted Averaging (IFWA) operator. Practical Implications: The functional significance of this work was determined in the form of a framework, the implementation of which will allow managers to assess and constantly monitor the implementation process of SD strategy. At the same time, the application of IT in I4.0 ensures the ability to control them. Originality/Value: As highlighted in the state-of-the-art analysis, none of the existing works supports all the presented features of the proposed approach to improving sustainable development in manufacturing in the Industry 4.0 context using F-TOPSIS and IFWA.