The IFI team, contributed to the development of this project alongside a team formed by the members of Technopolis Group, Austrian Institute of Technologies. A roadmap on the area of industrial technology, focused on human-centric R&I is developed. The work was performed under the European Commission framework contract “Foresight on Demand” and was completed in May 2024.
Human centricity is one of the three pillars of Industry 5.0. This Roadmap shows how industrial innovation ecosystem stakeholders can take a leading role in achieving human-centric outcomes in technology development and adoption, such as improving workers’ safety and wellbeing, upskilling or learning. There are significant opportunities to capture the transformative potential of ground-breaking technologies like artificial intelligence and virtual worlds through more human-centric and user-driven design approaches. The roadmap recommends that policy makers support integrating human-centricity considerations in education and training, R&I funding and in company training and innovation strategies.
The study starts by explaining the basis of its research: Industry 5.0 and Human-centricity. Industry 5.0 represents a transformative vision of the industry, positioning it as a driver of sustainability, resilience, and human-centricity. This vision supports a paradigm shift toward industries that operate within planetary boundaries, leave no one behind, and actively contribute to well-being and planetary regeneration.
Human-centricity is one of the three pillars of Industry 5.0, aligning with the European Commission’s priorities for an Economy that Works for People, alongside initiatives for a Europe Fit for the Digital Age and the EU Green Deal. In other words, it is a framework that places human needs, characteristics and experiences at the centre of design, development and implementation of technological solutions. Historically, human-centricity in technology development has been approached through Human-Centred Design (HCD).
However, the adoption of human-centric approaches faces important challenges. Difficulties in technology design encompass the absence of practical guidelines and standards, the complexity arising from required high customisation, and the difficulty in adopting a multidisciplinary approach involving ergonomics, behavioural science, cognitive processes, and socio-cultural dimensions within the manufacturing workforce.
Adoption and implementation of human-centric approaches to technology need further evidence of a favourable return on investment and are faced with complications due to the multidisciplinary requirements in deployment, attracting a skilled workforce, ensuring harmonious integration with existing infrastructure, budget constraints and increased workloads during scale-up.
The roadmap outlines key dimensions for advancing human-centricity in Industry 5.0 taking the previous challenges into account:
- Technologies and their potential: the roadmap identifies technologies that leverage human creativity and intelligent machines to create resource-efficient, user-centred manufacturing solutions.
- Organizational environment: it focuses on processes, methods, and managerial practices that enhance human-centricity, such as human-centred design processes and workflow management.
- R&I investments: highlights public and private sector investments in human-centric technologies and start-ups.
- Framework conditions: examines societal, demographic, and governance drivers, as well as skills, competencies, and infrastructure needed to support human-centricity.
Authors
European Commission: Directorate-General for Research and Innovation, Seán O’Reagain, Lura Roman, Doris Schröcker, Evgeni Evgeniev and Peter Dröl. With the collaboration of Orestas Strauka Carmen Moreno, Izabella Martins Grapengiesser, Krystel Montpetit, Viola Peter, Karl-Heinz Leitner, Huu-Quynh-Huong Nyuyen, Nico Pintar, Wolfram Rhomberg, Manfred Tscheligi, Setareh Zafari and Totti Könnölä . ERA Industrial Technologies Roadmap on Human-Centric Research and Innovation – Foresight on demand (FoD), Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.
Totti Könnölä, CEO of the Insight Foresight Institute, will participate in the Scientific Conference on Transformative Innovation Policies and will be in the Roundtable organized around circular economy and industry 4.0. Totti will share his views on ”digital platforms as a lever to promote circular economy”.
Innovation and entrepreneurship are key drivers for economic growth and competitiveness. While recent policies also aim at promoting sustainability and better governance, many analysts have pointed to Europe’s inability to create a suitable environment in which a vivid entrepreneurial culture could flourish.
