Challenges of implementing industry 4.0 technology in machine-based manufacturing for SMEs.

Once German Government had declared their Industry 4.0 strategy, many countries also followed suit to set their aim on promoting the manufacturing computerization in their country. However, there is a gap between the existing machines and the technology advances in Industry 4.0 such as cloud computing, internet of things, system integration and etcetera. The lack of experience to develop the industry 4.0 infrastructure is also one of the major obstacles in the developing countries. The aim of this paper is to address the challenges of implementing industry 4.0 Technology in machine-based manufacturing for small and medium companies. This paper focuses on Malaysia's Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) that are undergoing Industry 4.0 transformation in order to serve as a reference for other developing countries like Malaysia in which a lot of SMEs are facing similar challenges. Based on the literature review and real cases in collaboration with companies in the industry, the challenges of data collection and system interoperability as well as the solutions are presented in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]