Industrial Agents as a Key Enabler for Realizing Industrial Cyber-Physical Systems: Multiagent Systems Entering Industry 4.0

Industrial agents (IAs) [1] are multiagent-based systems (MASs) [2] that, for many years, have been advocated as a promising and realistic solution for an emerging set of industrial challenges. In the past, MASs fell into the scope of enterprise agility [3]-[8], and now, more than ever, pertain to the industrial digital transformation and sustainability spheres. MAS technology is being applied to several industrial applications in the cyber-physical system (CPS) context, namely, in smart production, smart electric grids, smart logistics, and smart health care [9]. To understand the future potential of IAs, one must first have a sufficiently concise view of the past and present efforts, i.e., understand their early applications and current directions. Such a view is necessary because, over the last decades, the concept of the IA has proven to be a bit of a moving target, adjusting to the needs, visions, and technologies of each era.