Learning from the past: barriers and enablers for industry 4.0 adoption

The industrial sector has faced different revolutions in the last centuries. Currently we are in the middle of the fourth industrial revolution. Businesses are trying to benefit from the new technologies that come with this revolution, but many businesses fail to adopt this new revolution because of barriers that withhold these businesses to adopt these new technologies. But in the last decades there were two major developments more, the rise of the internet/e-commerce and the growing interest in environmental sustainability. This research aims to find similarities between the barriers found with the adoption of e-commerce and environmental sustainability and the predicted challenges faced by the adoption of industry 4.0. The similarities that are found can help business to overcome the barriers that are withholding them from adopting the fourth industrial revolution.