The term “Intelligentization” was first introduced by the Chinese State Council in its National Artificial Intelligence Strategy (Webster, Creemers, Triolo, & Kania, 2017) translated as “Next Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan” to refer to the next generation of intelligent systems, in which decision making is a key capability of the AI machines. For the past four decades, China adopted strict and fruitful industrial policies, that resulted in the successful transformation of China’s economy to a leading industrialized one. However, before the adoption of policies and plans for “Industry 4.0” in Europe, in the year 2010, China surpassed the United States, for the first time in modern history, as the world’s largest manufacturer and it continues to widen its lead (see Table 1) (China Solidifies Its Position as the World’s Largest Manufacturer, 2015). The Wall Street Journal calls it the “New Industrial Revolution”, and the Huffington Post called it a “bullet train” that “propels the manufacturers that climb on board” (Kennell, 2015).

In the years that follow, Germany and the European Union adopted policies and plans that rely on Smart Manufacturing (SM) technologies to increase their national manufacturing production.

In 2011 the term “Industry 4.0” (Rüßmann, et al., 2015) (Erol, Schumacher, & Sihn, 2016) Came to define the 4th Generation of industry (Digitale Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, n.d.) after the Hannover fair in Germany.

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