Socio-economic variables driving 4.0 projects in last mile logistics

The increasing number of people living in urban areas is determining a higher demand for logistics activities in urban environments, with consequent problems related to traffic congestion, air and noise pollution, infrastructure wear, and artistic heritage deterioration. The need of dealing with these negative impacts is fostering all the involved stakeholders of an urban logistics system to try to pursue higher levels of efficiency. In this context, the idea of City Logistics, intended as all the services aimed to better manage goods circulation throughout the cities, has been increasing its importance. In urban environments, the adoption of 4.0 technologies might play a crucial role trying to optimize the service, in terms of digitalization, automation, and interconnection not only along the supply chain but also on its last mile. The objective of this paper is to deeply investigate this topic by analysing how contextual factors could influence the investment strategies on these innovative solutions. To this end, an empirical model based on a regression analysis has been developed to investigate which socio-economics determinants had a significant influence on investment policies in 105 City Logistics projects applying 4.0 technologies. Thus, some variables have been identified, considering several crucial determinants that may affect the choice of investing in a given market, namely economic, strategic, and legal. Additionally, given the urban context, indicators which could describe the demographic aspect of cities were also included. The presented analysis shows that Gross Domestic Product (GDP), Foreign Direct Investments, R&D Expenditure, Employment rate, and Number of Inhabitants result as significant drivers of the development of 4.0 technologies in urban environments. The empirical analysis carried out introduces new observations on the enabling factors of 4.0 solutions, highlighting the most suitable socio-economic conditions for their development in the context of City Logistics.