A Strategy Cycle Nexus for Circular Economy and Industry 4.0 Integration: A Global Expert Perspective
Business Strategy and the Environment
Published online on June 11, 2026
Abstract
["Business Strategy and the Environment, EarlyView. ", "\nABSTRACT\nThe adoption of circular economy (CE) practices supported by Industry 4.0 (I4.0) technologies remains limited, despite their strong potential to enhance sustainable performance (SP). Organizations continue to face practical challenges in identifying effective strategies, enabling technologies, and implementation conditions. Drawing on 20 semistructured interviews with scholars and practitioners engaged in CE initiatives and I4.0 adoption across diverse sectors globally, this research examines how CE–I4.0 integration is implemented in practice. The findings identify four interrelated strategic themes shaping CE–I4.0 integration: policy and governance, organizational, technological, and social and ethical. These themes capture how regulatory frameworks, organizational practices, digital capabilities, and social considerations collectively influence the implementation of CE–I4.0 initiatives. Within and across these themes, strategies interact dynamically with enabling opportunities and implementation challenges, forming a continuous strategy cycle in which policy frameworks shape organizational practices, guide technological adoption, support social and ethical outcomes, and are refined through feedback from implementation. By conceptualizing CE–I4.0 integration as a dynamic and interaction‐driven process, this study advances research on sustainability strategies. It also proposes a strategy cycle nexus framework that provides actionable guidance for managers and policymakers seeking to design and implement effective, digitally enabled CE transitions.\n"]