AI-enabled evolution: unveiling the synergy between manufacturing and services through coordination and integration

Coordination and integration are fundamental pillars of modern supply chains, within which manufacturing and service operations function as two core components. Recently, the growing availability of data, coupled with rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI), has significantly accelerated the adoption of AI technologies across manufacturing and service domains. Against this backdrop, we completed a special issue titled “AI-Enabled Evolution: Unveiling the Synergy between Manufacturing and Services through Coordination and Integration” to showcase the latest developments in this domain. In this editorial, we first outline the background and review existing literature on AI applications in operations management. We then present the papers included in this issue, highlighting how various AI techniques are applied across manufacturing and service contexts, encompassing performance improvement and sustainability advancement, optimisation and decision-making framework development, as well as applications in logistics, scheduling, and risk management. Finally, we conclude by identifying promising avenues for future research.