**4. Challenging issues related to Industry 4.0**

There are no doubts about the enormous challenges that Industry 4.0 will bring to the current practice of production, consumption, and global value chain (GVC). Firms and policymakers need to take into consideration adequate strategies to better implement the Industry 4.0 systems, re-organize business activities by taking into consideration of new context and take other caution for the long-term growth of the fourth industrial revolution and reap profit from it. We will define and analyze in this section the challenges raised by Industry 4.0, starting with implementation challenges, then the challenges surrounding the management of Human resources, then the risks to data security, then the Big Data challenges, and finally, the challenges concerning the environment.

#### **4.1 Implementation challenges and inequalities**

As we established earlier, the transition to Industry 4.0 brings countless opportunities for businesses to increase their efficiency and development. However, there are many barriers to the implementation of Industry 4.0, the most important lackings are the shortages of skill-sets that are required in the Industry 4.0 phenomenon. There is also a lack of experience and hindsight on the transition, the necessity to remodel the entire organization, and the coordination of data resources. Added to these challenges are the inequality between SMEs and MNCs in terms of

resources, focus, and strategies in the transition to Industry 4.0. This section will present the three main difficulties faced by firms integrating Industry 4.0.
