Techanamurthy Umawathy, Iqbal Muhammad Saqib, Abdul Rahim Zulhasni
Department of Engineering Education, Faculty of Engineering Education & Built Environment, National University of Malaysia, Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia.
NUST Business School, National University of Science and Technology, Islamabad, Pakistan.
PLoS One. 2025 May 20;20(5):e0324052. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0324052. eCollection 2025.
This study examines the industry 4.0 readiness of 506 Malaysian SMEs, focussing on key factors that contribute to frequent failures in their strategic planning processes. Driven by rapid technological advancements such as IoT, AI, and big data analytics, Industry 4.0 presents opportunities and challenges for SMEs striving to remain competitive in a global digital economy. Despite government efforts such as Malaysia's Industry4WRD programme, SMEs need help with leadership, digital infrastructure, and workforce competency. This study aims to provide an in-depth analysis of these readiness factors using data from the Industry4WRD assessment framework, evaluating dimensions such as leadership, governance, digital infrastructure, workforce competency, and strategic alignment on a scale of 0-4. The results indicate that leadership and strategic alignment score the highest with a mean of 0.81, while workforce competency scores the lowest at 0.35, highlighting significant competency gaps. Leadership shows a strong positive correlation (0.92) with overall readiness, underscoring its critical role. Sectoral analysis reveals that the chemical sector demonstrates the highest readiness, while Selangor and Johor are the leading regions driven by more robust digital infrastructure. This study emphasises the need for targeted improvements in leadership development, digital infrastructure, and workforce training to bridge readiness gaps, particularly in less developed regions and industries. The findings support the objectives of Malaysia's New Industrial Master Plan 2030 (NIMP 2030), offering actionable insights for policy makers and leaders of SMEs with the aim of fostering comprehensive digital transformation and strengthening the competitiveness of SMEs in the era of Industry 4.0.
本研究考察了506家马来西亚中小企业对工业4.0的准备情况，重点关注导致其战略规划过程频繁失败的关键因素。在物联网、人工智能和大数据分析等快速技术进步的推动下，工业4.0为努力在全球数字经济中保持竞争力的中小企业带来了机遇和挑战。尽管马来西亚有“工业4WRD”计划等政府举措，但中小企业在领导力、数字基础设施和劳动力能力方面仍需帮助。本研究旨在利用“工业4WRD”评估框架的数据，对这些准备因素进行深入分析，在0至4的量表上评估领导力、治理、数字基础设施、劳动力能力和战略一致性等维度。结果表明，领导力和战略一致性得分最高，平均分为0.81，而劳动力能力得分最低，为0.35，凸显了显著的能力差距。领导力与整体准备情况呈现出强烈的正相关（0.92），强调了其关键作用。行业分析显示，化工行业的准备情况最佳，而雪兰莪州和柔佛州是受更强大数字基础设施驱动的领先地区。本研究强调需要有针对性地改进领导力发展、数字基础设施和劳动力培训，以弥合准备差距，特别是在欠发达地区和行业。研究结果支持了马来西亚《2030年新工业总体规划》（NIMP 2030）的目标，为政策制定者和中小企业领导者提供了可操作的见解，旨在促进全面的数字转型并增强中小企业在工业4.0时代的竞争力。
