Medical Devices on the Context of the Next Industrial Revolution

This paper summarizes consideration about the Next Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0 - the fourth stage of the Industrial Revolution) and the impact on the medical devices.

The Industry 4.0 incorporates positive intentions across a wide spectrum of human concerns and can be framed as the following assignment.

Design an industrial product for the 21^th century that:

*introduces no hazardous materials into the air, water, or soil;

*measures prosperity by how much natural capital we can accrue in productive ways;

*measures progress by how many products have no dangerous effluents;

*does not require regulations whose purpose is to stop us from killing ourselves too quickly;

*produces nothing that will require future generations to maintain vigilance.

The medical devices which become smarter as part of cyber-physical systems (CPS) to create the so-called “Industrial Internet of Things” (IIoT), need to be ready for integration in an Internet of Services (IoS), which opening new possibilities for providers.

To enable the transition to Industry 4.0, MES (manufacturing execution systems) for medical devices must address the challenges of a logical decentralization and a vertical integration to support highly automated CPS with operation dispersed across different systems.

The lecture will emphasis how Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), Cloud, Big data analytics, e-health, cyber-security, traceability throughout the Supply Chain, increased Mobility, 3D printing, as parts of Industry 4.0 will impact the future medical devices industry.