This paper proposes a novel approach to software supply chain security management leveraging the inherent characteristics of blockchain technology. The core claim is to build a robust management system capable of guaranteeing the integrity and traceability of software components throughout their lifecycle. The proposed mechanism utilizes a blockchain network to record critical data points related to the software supply chain, including code commits, build processes, and security audits. Smart contracts are then employed to automate security checks, enforce access control, and trigger alerts based on predefined rules. This approach addresses the escalating risks associated with compromised software supply chains by providing an immutable and auditable record of all activities. The research highlights the potential of blockchain to significantly enhance software security and trust within complex, distributed development environments. The key contribution lies in the systematic application of blockchain and smart contracts specifically tailored for supply chain security, offering a verifiable and resilient solution.
Martin Končár, Adel Aazami, Sebastian Kummer, Navid Mohammadi
Digital technologies are widely expected to reshape supply chains, yet the conditions under which they deliver operational and sustainability-related value in practice remain insufficiently understood. This study examines how digital technologies influence supply chain operations and performance, where performance is operationalized through demand forecasting accuracy, cost, lead time, visibility, and inter-organizational collaboration, and asks how these technologies can support more resilient, resource-efficient, and sustainable supply chain operations. The study adopts an exploratory qualitative design based on semi-structured interviews with eight supply chain professionals at manager level or above, drawn from the aluminum, elevator, railway, food, and consumer goods industries in Austria, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic, and conducted between March and June 2025. A structured literature review complements the interview evidence. Within this exploratory sample, Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics were the most widely adopted technologies (five of eight participants each), followed by the Internet of Things (four of eight) and Automation (five of eight), while no participant reported active Blockchain deployment. Reported benefits concentrated on forecasting accuracy, operational efficiency, visibility, and collaboration, whereas high implementation costs, legacy system integration, skill shortages, and regulatory uncertainty formed the principal barriers. The central finding is a conditional relationship between adoption and competitiveness: internal operational gains did not automatically translate into competitive advantage among the professionals interviewed, but appeared to require strategic alignment, cross-functional integration, and performance measurement. Because digitally enabled forecasting, inventory positioning, and resource optimization also reduce waste and improve resource utilization, the findings link digital supply chain transformation to sustainable development objectives. This exploratory study of eight participants therefore provides practitioner-level propositions and a research agenda for digital and sustainable supply chain transformation rather than statistically generalizable findings.
The integration of artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and blockchain may provide a viable approach to tackle persistent operational and informational challenges in cleaner production. This conceptual review synthesizes existing literature and presents an integrated AI-IoT-blockchain framework mapped across the four sequential stages of cleaner production: source reduction, process control, end-of-pipe treatment and recycling, and full-chain traceability. The literature indicates that IoT enables real-time sensing, AI drives predictive and prescriptive analytics, and blockchain ensures tamper-proof record-keeping and stakeholder trust. Together, these technologies may help address long-standing barriers including fragmented data, delayed responses, and a lack of verifiability. Despite challenges such as high costs, technical fragmentation, and organizational resistance, several emerging strategies have been proposed in the literature to address these challenges. These include modular deployment, federated learning, permissioned blockchains, and regulatory sandboxes. The framework’s underlying architecture appears transferable across sectors, subject to industry-specific adaptation, supporting sustainable manufacturing, the circular economy, and low-carbon development.
The convergence of AI, Blockchain, IoT, Digital Twins, quantum computing, and FKF spectral methods constitutes a decisive research direction for next-generation logistics, especially when examined through the lens of Smart Mobility and Intelligent Transportation Systems [9]. Future work must prioritize real-time fusion of connected-vehicle and smart-infrastructure data streams, construction of scalable multi-resolution Digital Twin environments that span both supply chains and urban mobility networks, development of trustworthy AI models for predictive and prescriptive control, realization of practical hybrid quantum–classical optimizers for the combinatorial problems that dominate intelligent transportation and logistics, and computationally efficient multi-scale spectral analysis of complex temporal dynamics. Empirical validation across transportation, inventory, energy, and disruption scenarios incorporating advances in battery technologies [5], [10], solar-assisted and hybrid vehicle architectures [12], [28], and Industry 5.0 human-centric automation [27]will be indispensable. Realizing these advances will transform intelligent logistics from a conceptual integration into operational, sustainable, and resilient supply-chain systems that fully exploit the emerging capabilities of smart mobility ecosystems [1]–[28].
A convergent supply-chain architecture is proposed by integrating Digital Twins with Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain, Internet of Things (IoT), quantum computing, and FKF spectral analysis to address the growing complexity, uncertainty, and disruption risks in modern logistics. Digital Twins enable real-time virtual representation, simulation, monitoring, and disruption-response analysis, while AI extracts predictive and prescriptive intelligence from continuous IoT-generated data. Blockchain strengthens data integrity, transparency, security, and end-to-end traceability across supply-chain transactions. Quantum annealing supports computationally intensive logistics optimization problems, including routing, resource allocation, scheduling, and ULD configuration. FKF-based spectral features provide a mathematical representation of shifts, modulation effects, lead-time behavior, transient variations, and multiscale supply-chain dynamics. The integration of these complementary technologies enables information to flow from real-time sensing and trusted data management to spectral analysis, predictive intelligence, simulation, and advanced optimization. Together, the proposed architecture provides an adaptive, intelligent, sustainable, and resilient framework for monitoring supply-chain conditions, anticipating disruptions, evaluating alternative decisions, and improving overall logistics performance.
This study introduces an FKF-enabled intelligent supply-chain framework that integrates Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain, Internet of Things (IoT), Digital Twins, and quantum optimization into a unified architecture. The FKF transform provides a mathematical spectral representation of supply-chain signals, enabling the identification of temporal shifts, modulation effects, multiscale patterns, demand fluctuations, and lead-time dynamics. These spectral features can be supplied to AI and machine-learning models to improve forecasting, anomaly detection, disruption prediction, and resilience assessment. IoT devices continuously provide real-time operational data from transportation, inventory, production, and logistics processes, while Blockchain supports secure data sharing, traceability, and transaction transparency across supply-chain participants. Digital Twins complement these technologies by creating dynamic virtual representations of physical supply-chain systems, allowing alternative scenarios, disruptions, and recovery strategies to be simulated before implementation. Quantum annealing is incorporated to address selected computationally intensive combinatorial decisions, such as routing, scheduling, resource allocation, and logistics configuration. By connecting FKF-based mathematical spectral intelligence with AI-driven analytics, trusted digital infrastructure, simulation capabilities, and emerging quantum optimization, the proposed framework provides an integrated pathway toward more predictive, adaptive, transparent, sustainable, and resilient supply-chain management. The content should be logically organized in a single paragraph, maintaining coherence and clarity throughout. Ensure that the abstract captures the research context, problem statement, approach, key results, and final conclusions in a balanced manner. Keywords— Quantum Computing; Quantum Annealing; Logistics Optimization; Unit Load Device Configuration; Supply Chain Management; Artificial Intelligence; Digital Twins; Blockchain; Supply Chain Resilience; FKF Transform.
This study proposes a convergent framework integrating AI, Blockchain, IoT, Digital Twins, quantum computing, and FKF spectral analysis for sustainable and resilient supply chains. AI supports prediction and optimization, Blockchain improves transparency and traceability, IoT enables real-time sensing, and Digital Twins facilitate simulation and adaptive disruption management. Quantum annealing addresses selected combinatorial logistics problems, including ULD configuration, while FKF methods characterize temporal shifts, modulation, multiscale dynamics, and lead-time variations. The integration establishes a closed-loop architecture linking sensing, spectral analysis, intelligence, simulation, trust, and optimization for adaptive logistics decision-making.