Contextual Difference in the Drivers of Internet-of-Things-Adoption in Road, Rail, and Maritime Freight Transport

The Internet of Things (IoT) is widely considered an important infrastructure for enhancing the transparency of processes and the quality of business decisions in the era of Industry 4.0 (I4.0). Yet, little is known about the differential drivers of the adoption of IoT for different modes of freight transport. Since the modes of freight transport differ substantially, the purpose of this article is to compare the contextual differences among IoT adoption drivers in road, rail, and maritime freight transport and assess the suitability of different modes of freight transport for IoT adoption. The identified drivers for IoT adoption are classified under the technology, organization, and environmental framework, and the relative weight of drivers for road, rail, and maritime freight transport are compared using fuzzy analytic network process method. The most important drivers for freight transport are competitive advantage, management support (MGS), and security and privacy. Comparatively, the most prioritized driver for road transport is investment cost, for rail transport is MGS, and for maritime is the ease of use. This article found the maritime transport as the best mode to adopt IoT using multiobjective optimization on the basis of a ratio analysis plus the full multiplicative form method. The results identify prospective customers for IoT adoption, help the government and policymakers develop transport policies, including freight modal share and National Rail Plan vision, and assist transport managers in developing strategies for I4.0.