Innovations in business process digitalisation in the forest-wood sector in Slovenia

Digital technology can help businesses automate and streamline various processes to optimise resource use and improve the efficiency of their operations and reduce costs. The aim of this paper is to study digitalisation in Slovenia’s forest-wood sector which is important to the country’s smart specialisation strategy. Based on a survey we conducted among 294 enterprises in this sector we study a subsample of innovators that were asked if they introduced or are planning to introduce innovations in business process digitalisation such as collaboration with IT or data experts, implementation of sensor technologies, digital modelling and simulation, collaborative platforms, and other technologies that can help the sector to improve manufacturing and production processes, logistics and sales. The results show that the adoption of digital technologies is correlated with enterprise strategy, investments in research and development, collaboration with universities and research institutes, share of employees with a tertiary degree and in research, development, and innovation positions, and with enterprise size.