Unlocking the Potential of Mass Customization Through Industry 4.0: Mapping Research Streams and Future Directions
Source abstract
Abstract
Mass customization (MC) has become a pivotal manufacturing strategy for addressing the growing demand for personalized products without compromising cost efficiency and scalability. The emergence of Industry 4.0 (I4.0) has further expanded the potential of MC by enabling intelligent, flexible, and interconnected production systems. This paper presents a systematic literature review covering the period from 2011 to 2024, aimed at examining how I4.0 technologies influenced the conceptual evolution, technological enablers, and supply chain implications of MC. A total of 3441 publications were retrieved from Scopus and analyzed using a combination of bibliometric mapping and qualitative synthesis. The review identifies three primary research streams: (1) MC conceptual frameworks and performance metrics, (2) enabling technologies and methods across the product lifecycle, and (3) supply chain strategies tailored to MC environments. Key enablers such as product modularity, customer co-design platforms, additive manufacturing, and reconfigurable production systems are discussed, along with barriers related to complexity, integration challenges, and sustainability trade-offs. The study highlights a gradual convergence toward mass personalization, supported by real-time data, artificial intelligence, and predictive analytics. The findings offer a structured understanding of MC in the I4.0 context and point toward future research opportunities involving digital twin integration, cross-disciplinary implementation models, and sustainability-driven customization frameworks.
Source: crossref · Quality: baseline
Research context
OpenAlex topics: Product Development and Customization · Design Education and Practice · Service and Product Innovation
SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.
Affiliations
Department of Industrial Engineering, Alma Mater Studiorum—University of Bologna, Viale del Risorgimento 2, 40136 Bologna, Italy
References (100+)
Show source-provided references
1. An analysis of order fulfilment approaches for delivering variety and customisation10.1080/00207543.2013.852703 ↗
2. Globalization and the Gains from Variety10.1162/qjec.2006.121.2.541 ↗
3. Part family formation method for delayed reconfigurable manufacturing system based on machine learning10.1007/s10845-022-01956-7 ↗
4. Extended value network modelling and simulation for mass customization implementation10.1007/s10845-010-0493-1 ↗
5. Product platforms design, selection and customisation in high-variety manufacturing10.1080/00207543.2019.1602745 ↗
6. From future perfect: Mass customizing10.1108/eb054249 ↗
7. Pine, B.J. (1993). Mass Customization: The New Frontier in Business Competition, Harvard Business School Press.
8. Demographics of mass customization: A global study of manufacturing plants10.1590/0103-6513.163113 ↗
9. From mass customization to mass personalization: A strategic transformation10.1007/s10696-008-9048-6 ↗
10. Cracking the code of mass customization
11. The mass customization decade: An updated review of the literature10.1016/j.ijpe.2012.03.002 ↗
12. Simpson, T.W., Marion, T., de Weck, O., Holtta-Otto, K., Kokkolaras, M., and Shooter, S.B. (2006, January 10–13). Platform-based design and development: Current trends and needs in industry. Proceedings of the ASME 2006 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
13. Mass customization: Reflections on the state of the concept10.1007/s10696-005-5170-x ↗
14. Smart Product Design and Production Control for Effective Mass Customization in the Industry 4.0 Concept
15. Internet-based framework to support integration of customer in the design of customizable products10.1177/1063293X06068391 ↗
16. Implementation of biomechanical mating conditions in CAD10.3722/cadaps.2008.338-353 ↗
17. Chandra, C., and Kamrani, A. (2004). Mass Customization: A Supply Chain Approach, Kluwer Academic Press.10.1007/978-1-4419-9015-0 ↗
18. Optimization analysis of supply chain scheduling in mass customization10.1016/j.ijpe.2008.10.008 ↗
19. A service-oriented architecture for mass customization: A shoe industry case study10.1109/TEM.2006.889076 ↗
20. Affective and cognitive design for mass personalization: Status and prospect10.1007/s10845-012-0673-2 ↗
21. A Comprehensive study on Current and Future Trends towards the Characteristics and Enablers of Industry 4.0
22. Hermann, M., Pentek, T., and Otto, B. (2024, September 15). Design Principles for Industrie 4.0 Scenarios: A Literature Review. Available online: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/307864150_Design_Principles_for_Industrie_40_Scenarios_A_Literature_Review?channel=doi&linkId=57cfd2fb08aed6789701cbeb&showFulltext=true.
23. Intelligent Manufacturing in the Context of Industry 4.0: A Review10.1016/J.ENG.2017.05.015 ↗
24. A cross-sectorial review of industrial best practices and case histories on Industry 4.0 technologies10.1002/sys.21697 ↗
25. Schmidt, R., Möhring, M., Härting, R., Reichstein, C., Neumaier, P., and Jozinović, P. (2015). Industry 4.0—Potentials for Creating Smart Products: Empirical Research Results. Business Information Systems, Springer.10.1007/978-3-319-19027-3_2 ↗
26. Mass customization: Literature review and research directions10.1016/S0925-5273(00)00079-7 ↗
27. A review of mass customization across marketing, engineering and distribution domains toward development of a process framework10.1007/s00163-013-0162-4 ↗
28. The PRISMA 2020 statement: An updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews10.1136/bmj.n71 ↗
29. Fogliatto, F.S., and Da Silveira, G.J.C. (2011). Process Typology of Mass Customizers. Mass Customization, Springer.10.1007/978-1-84996-489-0 ↗
30. Configuring Products to Address the Customization-Responsiveness Squeeze: A Survey of Management Issues and Opportunities10.1016/j.ijpe.2003.09.003 ↗
31. Prospect of Design for Mass Customization and Personalization
32. Haapala, K.R., Zhao, F., Camelio, J., Sutherland, J.W., Skerlos, S.J., Dornfeld, D.A., Jawahir, I.S., Zhang, H.C., and Clarens, A.F. (2011, January 13–17). A Review of Engineering Research in Sustainable Manufacturing. Proceedings of the ASME 2011 International Manufacturing Science and Engineering Conference, Corvallis, OR, USA.10.1115/MSEC2011-50300 ↗
33. Implementation of Mass Customization Tools in Small and Medium Enterprises
34. Sustainable Mass Customized Enterprise: Key Concepts, Enablers and Assessment Techniques10.3182/20120523-3-RO-2023.00242 ↗
35. A Sustainability and Mass Customization Assessment Framework
36. Poler, R., Carneiro, L.M., Jasinski, T., Zolghadri, M., and Pedrazzoli, P. (2012). Sustainable Mass Customization Assessment. Intelligent Non-hierarchical Manufacturing Networks, Wiley.10.1002/9781118607077 ↗
37. Applying text-mining to personalization and customization research literature—Who, what and where?10.1016/j.eswa.2012.02.042 ↗
38. Mass customization: The bane of OD or the cure to what ails it?10.1108/LODJ-01-2012-0002 ↗
39. Evolving Paradigms of Manufacturing: From Mass Production to Mass Customization and Personalization10.1016/j.procir.2013.05.002 ↗
40. Boër, C., Pedrazzoli, P., Bettoni, A., and Sorlini, M. (2013). Mass Customization and Sustainability: An Assessment Framework and Industrial Implementation, Springer.10.1007/978-1-4471-5116-6 ↗
41. Systems Thinking for Service Delivery Design: A Real Time Mass Customisation Model10.3182/20130619-3-RU-3018.00053 ↗
42. Prabhu, V., Taisch, M., and Kiritsis, D. (2013). Sustainability Evaluation of Mass Customization. Advances in Production Management Systems. Sustainable Production and Service Supply Chains, Springer. IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology.10.1007/978-3-642-41266-0 ↗
43. Prabhu, V., Taisch, M., and Kiritsis, D. (2013). Assessment of Process Robustness for Mass Customization. Advances in Production Management Systems. Sustainable Production and Service Supply Chains, Springer. IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology.10.1007/978-3-642-41266-0 ↗
44. Storbjerg, S.H., Nielsen, K., and Brunoe, T.D. (2013, January 29–30). Choice Navigation: Towards a Methodology for Performance Assessment. Proceedings of the Configuration Workshop, Vienna, Austria.
45. Zaeh, M.F. (2014). Mass Customisation Assessment and Measurement Framework. Enabling Manufacturing Competitiveness and Economic Sustainability, Springer International Publishing.10.1007/978-3-319-02054-9 ↗
46. Osorio, J., Romero, D., Betancur, M., and Molina, A. (2014, January 23–25). Design for sustainable mass-customization: Design guidelines for sustainable mass-customized products. Proceedings of the 2014 International Conference on Engineering, Technology and Innovation (ICE), Bergamo, Italy.10.1109/ICE.2014.6871560 ↗
47. Brunoe, T.D., Nielsen, K., Joergensen, K.A., and Taps, S.B. (2014, January 4–7). Is Sustainable Mass Customization an Oxymoron? An Empirical Study to Analyze the Environmental Impacts of a MC Business Model. Proceedings of the 7th World Conference on Mass Customization, Personalization, and Co-Creation (MCPC 2014), Aalborg, Denmark. Lecture Notes in Production Engineering.10.1007/978-3-319-04271-8 ↗
48. Bayro-Corrochano, E., and Hancock, E. (2014). Environmental and Social Impacts of Mass Customization: An Analysis of Beginning-of-Life Phases. Progress in Pattern Recognition, Image Analysis, Computer Vision, and Applications, Springer International Publishing. Lecture Notes in Computer Science.
49. Hsiao, W.-P., and Chiu, M.-C. (2014). A Mass Personalization Methodology Based on Co-creation. Moving Integrated Product Development to Service Clouds in the Global Economy, IOS Press.
50. Brunoe, T.D., Nielsen, K., Joergensen, K.A., and Taps, S.B. (2014, January 4–7). Mass Customization Measurements Metrics. Proceedings of the 7th World Conference on Mass Customization, Personalization, and Co-Creation (MCPC 2014), Aalborg, Denmark. Lecture Notes in Production Engineering.10.1007/978-3-319-04271-8 ↗
51. Research on enterprise customization diagnosis for mass customization10.1007/s00170-014-6315-4 ↗
52. Gembarski, P.C., and Lachmayer, R. (2015, January 27–30). Degrees of Customization and Sales Support Systems-Enablers to Sustainibility in Mass Customization. Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Engineering Design (ICED15), Milan, Italy.
53. Tailoring performance evaluation to specific industrial contexts—Application to sustainable mass customisation enterprises10.1080/00207543.2014.974844 ↗
54. Leveraging the Sustainability Potential of Mass Customization through Product Service Systems in the Consumer Electronics Industry10.1016/j.procir.2015.03.007 ↗
55. A systematic service design methodology to achieve mass personalisation
56. Critical characteristics for the implementation of mass-customized services10.1108/EBR-03-2013-0066 ↗
57. Marx Gómez, J., and Scholtz, B. (2016). Mass Customization: Sustainability of a Computer-Based Manufacturing System. Information Technology in Environmental Engineering, Springer International Publishing. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics.10.1007/978-3-319-25153-0 ↗
58. Designing Business Models for Sustainable Mass Customization: A Framework Proposal
59. Bayro-Corrochano, E., and Hancock, E. (2014). Metrics for Assessing Product Variety Utilization. Progress in Pattern Recognition, Image Analysis, Computer Vision, and Applications, Springer International Publishing. Lecture Notes in Computer Science.10.1007/978-3-319-12568-8 ↗
60. Mourtzis, D., Fotia, S., and Boli, N. (2017, January 27–29). Metrics definition for the product-service system complexity within mass customization and industry 4.0 environment. Proceedings of the 2017 International Conference on Engineering, Technology and Innovation (ICE/ITMC), Funchal, Madeira, Portugal.10.1109/ICE.2017.8280013 ↗
61. Bellemare, J., Carrier, S., Nielsen, K., and Piller, F.T. (2017). Mass Customization in SMEs: Literature Review and Research Directions. Managing Complexity, Springer International Publishing. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics.10.1007/978-3-319-29058-4 ↗
62. Bellemare, J., Carrier, S., Nielsen, K., and Piller, F.T. (2017). Mass Customization Challenges of Engineer-to-Order Manufacturing. Managing Complexity, Springer International Publishing. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics.10.1007/978-3-319-29058-4 ↗
63. An introduction to personalization and mass customization10.1007/s10844-017-0465-4 ↗
64. Industry 4.0: A way from mass customization to mass personalization production10.1007/s40436-017-0204-7 ↗
65. Van Landeghem, V.H., and Aghezzaf, E. (2017). Complexity Issues in Mass Customized Manufacturing. Mass Customized Manufacturing, CRC Press. [1st ed.].10.1201/9781315398983-5 ↗
66. Modrak, V., and Bednar, S. (2017). Variety-induced complexity metrics. Mass Customized Manufacturing, CRC Press.10.1201/9781315398983 ↗
67. Impacts of intellectual capital on process innovation and mass customisation capability: Direct and mediating effects10.1080/00207543.2017.1343505 ↗
68. Product-service system (PSS) complexity metrics within mass customization and Industry 4.0 environment10.1007/s00170-018-1903-3 ↗
69. Hankammer, S., Nielsen, K., Piller, F.T., Schuh, G., and Wang, N. (2018). Validation of Metrics for Mass Customization: A Pre-study of Validation Methods. Customization 4.0, Springer International Publishing. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics.10.1007/978-3-319-77556-2 ↗
70. Hankammer, S., Nielsen, K., Piller, F.T., Schuh, G., and Wang, N. (2018). Impacts of Industry 4.0 on the Specific Case of Mass Customization Through Modeling and Simulation Approach. Customization 4.0, Springer International Publishing. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics.10.1007/978-3-319-77556-2 ↗
71. Singh, D., and Sharma, R.R.K. (2018, January 26–27). Personality of leaders of mass customization firms. Proceedings of the International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management, Paris, France.
72. Baranauskas, G. (2019). Mass personalization vs. mass customization: Finding variance in semantical meaning and practical implementation between sectors. Social Transformations in Contemporary Society (STICS 2019): Proceedings of the An Annual International Conference for Young Researchers, Tokyo, Japan, 29–30 November 2019, Mykolas Romeris University. no. 7.
73. Personalizing the Customization Experience: A Matching Theory of Mass Customization Interfaces and Cultural Information Processing10.1177/0022243719867698 ↗
74. Stehling, M.P., and Ruschel, R.C. (2019, January 15–17). A sustainable process for mass customization in the woodworking industry. Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Sustainable Construction Materials and Technologies, London, UK.
75. The Degree of Mass Personalisation under Industry 4.010.1016/j.procir.2019.04.050 ↗
76. Operations managers’ individual competencies for mass customization10.1108/IJOPM-10-2018-0592 ↗
77. Achieving Sustainable Mass Customization Capabilities—A Review
78. Becker, J.A. (2020, January 10–14). The Relationship of Factors on the Implementation of Mass Customized/Personalized Products. Proceedings of the 5th NA International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management, Detroit, MI, USA.
79. Implementing configurators to enable mass customization in the Engineer-to-Order industry: A multiple case study research10.1080/09537287.2020.1837941 ↗
80. Fathi, M., and Ghobakhloo, M. (2020). Enabling Mass Customization and Manufacturing Sustainability in Industry 4.0 Context: A Novel Heuristic Algorithm for in-Plant Material Supply Optimization. Sustainability, 12.10.3390/su12166669 ↗
81. An Entropy-Based Formulation for Assessing the Complexity Level of a Mass Customization Industry 4.0 Environment
82. The Effect of Intellectual Leadership on Mass Customization: Moderated Mediation Effect of Customer Market Knowledge10.1109/ACCESS.2021.3134720 ↗
83. The role of manufacturing efficiency in the achievement of sustainable mass customization 4.0
84. Mass customization and mass personalization meet at the crossroads of Industry 4.0: A case of augmented digital engineering10.1002/sys.21682 ↗
85. Galizia, F.G., and Bortolini, M. (2023). Is Mass Customisation Sustainable? A Literature-Based Analysis. Production Processes and Product Evolution in the Age of Disruption, Springer International Publishing. Lecture Notes in Mechanical Engineering.10.1007/978-3-031-34821-1 ↗
86. Massive personalized customization: New development of mass personalization
87. The relationship between mass customization and sustainable performance: The role of firm size and global E-commerce10.1016/j.heliyon.2024.e27726 ↗
88. Toward Mass Customized Product Deployment in E-Commerce: The Modularization Function and Postponement Strategy10.1080/10919392.2011.541000 ↗
89. Gillain, J., Faulkner, S., Heymans, P., Jureta, I., and Snoeck, M. (2012, January 2–7). Product portfolio scope optimization based on features and goals. Proceedings of the 16th International Software Product Line Conference, Salvador, Brazil.10.1145/2362536.2362559 ↗
90. Mining affective needs of automotive industry customers for building a mass-customization recommender system10.1007/s10845-011-0579-4 ↗
91. Research on the Customer Requirement Processing for Mass Customization10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMR.744.579 ↗
92. Mass customization in the product life cycle10.1007/s10845-012-0691-0 ↗
93. Xu, Y., Xu, J., and Bernard, A. (2013). Knowledge Management in E-commerce Mass Customization. Product Lifecycle Management for Society, Proceedings of the 10th IFIP WG 5.1 International Conference, PLM 2013, Nantes, France, 6–10 July 2013, Springer. Proceedings 10.10.1007/978-3-642-41501-2_26 ↗
94. Customers’ online shopping preferences in mass customization10.1057/dddmp.2013.34 ↗
95. Ma, J., Liu, Y., Xu, W., and Wang, C. (September, January 31). An optimal method on automobile mass customization delivery period based on customer behavior prediction. Proceedings of the 2014 IEEE Conference and Expo Transportation Electrification Asia-Pacific (ITEC Asia-Pacific), Beijing, China.
96. A web-based platform for mass customisation and personalisation10.1016/j.cirpj.2013.12.003 ↗
97. Saldivar, A.A.F., Goh, C., Li, Y., Chen, Y., and Yu, H. (2016, January 7–8). Identifying smart design attributes for Industry 4.0 customization using a clustering Genetic Algorithm. Proceedings of the 2016 22nd International Conference on Automation and Computing (ICAC), Colchester, UK.10.1109/IConAC.2016.7604954 ↗
98. The effects of e-mass customization on consumer perceived value, satisfaction, and loyalty toward luxury brands10.1016/j.jbusres.2016.04.174 ↗
99. Smart mobile apps for supporting product design and decision-making in the era of mass customisation10.1080/0951192X.2016.1187295 ↗
100. Co-creating customization: Collaborating with customers to deliver individualized value10.1108/SL-03-2017-0028 ↗