Lean Manufacturing and Industry 4.0: Unveiling Trends, Applications, and Global Impacts in Manufacturing Through Comprehensive Literature Review

The integration of Lean Manufacturing (LM) and Industry 4.0 (I4.0), also known as Lean Manufacturing 4.0 or Smart Factory, is increasingly adopted by manufacturers for their effectiveness in reducing losses and improving efficiency. Despite their established benefits, there is a notable gap in comprehensive analyses regarding the integration of I4.0’s Manufacturing Execution System (MES) and Total Productive Maintenance’s Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) within lean practices. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive literature review offering thorough insights into the trends, applications, and impacts of Lean Manufacturing 4.0. Utilizing a systematic literature review, this research initially assesses 250 papers for bibliometric trends, narrowing down to 44 papers for content analysis. The bibliometric analysis reveals trends in Lean Manufacturing 4.0 publications, including historical series, publications across countries, highly cited articles and types of papers. Noteworthy findings from the content analysis are the frequent connection between LM’s Process Mapping and I4.0’s MES, as well as the frequent association of I4.0’s Internet of Things with LM’s OEE. The OEE-I4.0 integration is predominantly characterized by enhanced OEE and real-time data utilization, while MES-Lean integration showcases documented impacts on production efficiency, resource management, and continuous and operational system improvement. This study highlights the importance of adopting relevant Lean Manufacturing 4.0 practices for manufacturers and scholars. The importance of Lean Manufacturing 4.0 practices and the understanding of connections between OEE and I4.0, as well as MES and LM, are addressed in this study, emphasizing the imperative for businesses to adopt Lean Manufacturing 4.0.