Human-centric Smart Manufacturing: Evolution and Outlook

The new technological and industrial revolution is driving manufacturing to a higher level, promoting the deep integration of new-generation information technology and advanced manufacturing technology, and enabling smart manufacturing toward autonomous intelligence. However, the purpose of production is to better meet human needs, and the role and contribution of production to society is required to be considered. Therefore, human-centric smart manufacturing(HCSM) has attracted more and more attention. Human is still the most important factor in a manufacturing system, so it is necessary to focus on HCSM. To this end, the human-centric problems are firstly addressed faced by smart manufacturing from two aspects: the evolution of human-machine/computer interaction and enterprise innovation along with the industrial revolutions, and the progressive correlation between production paradigms and human needs, in order to illustrate the necessity of introducing human-centric philosophy in smart manufacturing; and then summarized human-centric manufacturing evolution from the mechanized mass production in the first industrial revolution to today’s inclusive long-tail manufacturing, and illustrated the realization of HCSM idea exemplified by smart inclusive long-tail manufacturing, and finally the future development trend of HCSM is prospected. © 2022 Editorial Office of Chinese Journal of Mechanical Engineering. All rights reserved.