The transition from linear to circular material flows has become a priority across industries. However, Circular Economy (CE) transitions remain fragmented. Research and practice often emphasize isolated aspects such as business models or production processes, without considering systemic interactions that shape and determine long-term sustainability and profitability. This paper conducts a strategic scoping review to advance a system-level perspective on CE implementations. It proposes a novel Circular System (CS) framework that integrates circular production, manufacturing, and business-model literature into a multi-level conceptual framework for understanding system-level dependencies relevant to engineering implementations, especially related to CE. Drawing on socio-technical transition theory and engineering design the findings show how these domains overlap, reinforce, or conflict across the micro, meso, and macro levels. The CS framework clarifies the linkages between technological innovations, organizational change, financing, and policy that enable or hinder circular transformation. The analytical utility of the CS framework is demonstrated through a satellite reuse case, which reveals systemic lock-ins that prevent circularity in a high-tech industry. Findings highlight that circularity is most effective operationalized through coordinated design choices, industrial capabilities, financial incentives, and policy conditions across all system levels. Applied to satellite reusability, the framework identifies where circular strategies break down and highlights leverage points that can support sustainability and competitiveness, moving the CE beyond isolated practices toward an actionable pathway for industrial and societal transformation.

Increased circular behaviours in Small and Medium-sized (SME) manufacturing companies would strongly contribute to a more circular economy. However, previous research has identified that the development and adoption of a circular economy hindered by behavioural barriers on organisational as well as individual level. With a specific focus on cemented carbide tooling that is frequently used in machining operations, this paper aims to identify actors and interactions between actors that influence circular behaviours related to acquisition, utilisation, and end-of-life activities in manufacturing companies and how circular behaviour can be enabled based on these roles. Findings show that there are several actors with the potential to positively influence the transition to a circular economy if they adopt pro-circular behaviours, e.g. Operators, production planners, production technicians, as well as top management. Also, purchasing professionals are a central actor deeply involved in both recommendations and execution of decisions particularly related to acquisition activities; a framework for intervention is suggested to enable circular behaviours at all organisation levels based on organisational hierarchy and control planned behaviour theory (TPB). 

In the context of increasing global competition and rising environmental and social demands, manufacturing companies are under pressure to pursue sustainable growth while maintaining competitiveness. Although the convergence of digitalization and sustainability, known as the “twin transition”, has gained significant attention, understanding how digital technologies concretely support sustainability initiatives remains fragmented. This study explores the role of digital transformation in advancing sustainable practices within the manufacturing sector, drawing on empirical evidence from an industrial cluster. The findings reveal that while digital tools offer significant potential for improving resource efficiency, reducing emissions, and supporting sustainable operations, companies face persistent barriers such as stakeholder resistance, high initial costs, limited customer willingness to pay for sustainable products, and fragmented data utilization. Furthermore, organizational challenges, including low digital maturity, cultural resistance, and difficulties in aligning supply chain partners, continue to hinder progress. The study highlights the importance of employee engagement, transparent sustainability reporting, and strategic data management as critical enablers for the successful integration of digitalization and sustainability. By identifying both opportunities and challenges, the paper contributes to a deeper understanding of the systemic changes needed to leverage digital technologies for sustainable manufacturing and outlines avenues for future research across broader industrial contexts.

The green transition necessitates manufacturing companies to address climate change and incorporate sustainable and resilient solutions into their production. The best opportunity to achieve such solutions in production is during development, especially in greenfield projects with fewer constraints from existing production solutions. So far, the knowledge of how to achieve this is limited. Therefore, this paper aims to elaborate on how manufacturing companies can attain sustainable and resilient production. The focus is on development practices in greenfield projects and their relation to active ownership, collaboration and learning, potentially supporting the lasting impact of change initiatives.

The paper builds on results from a multiple case study, including three greenfield production development projects. A research design, involving 22 semi-structured interviews and four workshops, was applied. An analytical framework was developed to support the analysis, including active ownership, collaboration and learning. In total, 21 different development practices were identified and categorised into active ownership, collaboration, and learning. The paper contributes a new perspective on production development. As an alternative to the traditional planning-and-control perspective, a learning perspective on production development was applied, which is increasingly required for production development processes addressing new domains, such as the green transition.

Additive manufacturing (AM) enables the production of innovative, lightweight component designs in the aerospace industry. However, AM processes introduce new production feasibility considerations that must be addressed during product development. Therefore, engineers require effective design support and a new design approach to fully exploit AM’s capabilities while balancing its constraints. Through an interview study involving 20 AM aerospace industry professionals from nine countries and 10 organisations, this research identifies AM design opportunities and challenges and explores the design supports used to achieve and overcome them. The findings indicate that Laser Powder Bed Fusion is a predominant AM process in aeronautical and space applications. Further, the study identifies practical and computational design supports, describes how AM design is approached during product development and provides a model outlining a general AM design approach. Key AM design challenges identified include insufficient knowledge of material properties, limited sharing of design knowledge and a lack of understanding of the relationship between AM design and post-processing requirements. Consequently, skills gaps and educational needs for Design for AM in aerospace engineering are highlighted. Additionally, the study suggests that further AM aerospace standards, enhanced computer-aided engineering software for AM and artificial intelligence integration could improve design support.

Global businesses are transforming towards capturing more value from services, a business model transition called servitization. Digital servitization can help create and maintain a competitive advantage, as well as offering opportunities to tackle major challenges related to environmental pressures and rapidly changing market conditions. This study aims to bridge the gap between the theory of digital servitization and its implementation in the maritime shipping sector. This paper presents a multi-case study that explores the status, perceived challenges, and enablers for the adoption of digital servitization. Empirical data were collected from interviews with 13 companies and analyzed using the PESTEL and DPSIR frameworks. The results are presented across three categories based on the PESTEL framework: organizational context, global priorities, and sustainability. This study contributes to theory by providing empirical insights from the status of digital servitization in the maritime shipping industry. Also, it identifies challenges and needs that can support the transition towards digital servitization and the development of more sustainable solutions. Future research avenues are suggested to advance digital servitization in other industrial sectors.

This research examines how sustainable product design education can address the deficit in green talent. It presents a framework for a structured curriculum in product design, with hands-on activities, industry-specific case studies, and best practices in alternative design development. The impact of technologies like additive manufacturing on design is considered. Findings demonstrate that knowledge of technological capabilities, industry specific understanding, and proficiency in analytical tools such as Life Cycle Assessments contribute to sustainable designs mitigating a green talent gap.

The transition towards a circular economy requires an overarching perspective that recognises the dynamic and interdisciplinary nature of our current economic growth landscape. Circular economy inherently involves numerous stakeholders across the product life cycle. To establish efficient circular economy practices among these actors, this study suggests a novel framework for developing collaborative and interdisciplinary decision-making tools. By looking into relevant literature, organising a workshop, and analysing standard tools used in a circular economy like KPIs, risk analysis, Cost-Benefit Analysis, etc., we managed to capture the multidisciplinary challenges and dynamics faced by stakeholders of the circular business model. The contribution of this paper is the development of a framework that bridges requirement management techniques from product development practices with circular economy principles to facilitate effective decision-making processes. The framework effectively balances diverse stakeholder requirements, addressing uncertainties and multi-ownership challenges through product life cycles. This framework may be used to validate existing tools used by businesses and systematically develop new ones when needed. By facilitating collaboration around the circular economy, this framework not only reduces the environmental impact of economic growth but also encourages society to move towards more collective efforts to achieve sustainability. Finally, this article highlights the importance of a transdisciplinary approach in a systematic and effective transition to a circular economy.