Enhancing Digital Wings: A Phased Roadmap for the Adoption of Industry 4.0 in Integrated Poultry Systems to Increase Productive Performance and Sustainability

With the growing global demand for protein amidst climate pressures, the poultry sector, Brazil's main exporting power, estimated at 5.295 million exports in 2024, faces imperatives of efficiency and sustainability. Industry 4.0 (I4.0) technologies, such as IoT, AI, and big data, offer transformative potential, but empirical roadmaps for their implementation in vertically integrated rural chains are still scarce, particularly, in emerging economies. The objective of this study is to propose a roadmap for the implementation of I4.0 technologies in the poultry sector that positively impacts production performance. This gap is filled through a qualitative analysis of multiple cases in six poultry farms in Brazil, integrating on‐site observations, interviews, and 4 years of performance data. The results reveal that adopters achieve 12%–37% higher metrics in feed conversion, mortality, and ROI through stabilized microclimates and predictive analytics, while highlighting barriers such as rural connectivity deficits of 70%. Our new six‐phase roadmap, aligned with the PDCA cycle, which covers everything from diagnosis to optimization, prioritizes infrastructure and governance for rapid results with an 18–24 month ROI, incorporating socio‐technical equity to empower producers and integrators. This practice‐centered framework promotes management knowledge by merging digital adoption theory with specific agricultural contingencies.