Industry 4.0 Capacity Building Through Design & Engineering Competence. An Explorative Study On AI Integration In Tuscan Textile SMES

AI technology is being applied in manufacturing as a result of companies' ability to adapt to digital production and consumption models. In manufacturing companies that can digitize the process of production, artificial intelligence can lead to the optimization of strategies and operations between the manufacturing system and the consumer system. This work explores the topic of AI capacity building in advanced craft realities of the textile manufacturing in Italy. The paper shows how design & engineering academics can catalyze the integration of AI in the production and consumption systems of Tuscan Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). In particular, the research focuses on a series of workshops organized by the University of Pisa in collaboration with selected realities of Tuscan textile manufacturing. The aim of the series was to introduce companies to the potential of AI in production processes, providing possible creative methodologies and simulations applicable in their respective organizations. Indeed, the workshop topic was the simulation of AI integration throughout the textile supply chain. To support insights development, the authors provided companies with a tangible, instructional model. Specifically, by relying on the double diamond as the reference design approach, the authors designed a model of the creative process informed by the methods that are traditionally used in design thinking. Furthermore, the authors have drawn on existing examples from the textile industry to simplify the creative process of simulating AI integration.