Exploring Role of Knowledge Management in Industry 5.0: ERP Systems Can be an Assistance for Business in Knowledge Era?
Advances in information technology drive digital transformation, enabling enterprises to automate and streamline operations. As foundational digital platforms, ERP systems integrate with core Industry 5.0 (I5.0) technologies—including AI and IoT (Wijesinghe et al., 2024; Sarferaz, 2025; Yasser & Khalifa, 2025), to collect, share, and store their real-time data streams. Critically, ERP serves not only as an operational backbone but also as a knowledge management (KM) enabler: ERP integrates fragmented organizational data and workflows into a shared digital platform (Chesang, 2024). This may support the KM across the knowledge lifecycle—from creation and acquisition to utilization and sharing, and ultimately human-centered decision-making. Although ERP is widely used in enterprises, there has been limited explicit attention on it serving as a KM enabler in I5.0, which generates massive, real-time, multi-source, and heterogeneous data—rich in knowledge potential. However, low conversion efficiency, poor explicitation, and loss of implicit knowledge hinder data-driven decision-making, operational efficiency, and innovation. This study asks: In I5.0, can ERP support knowledge acquisition, conversion, utilization, and retention? While ERP, KM, and I5.0 are advancing rapidly, research explicitly defining *I5.0-integrated ERP* as a KM enabler is limited. We hypothesize that ERP systems adapted for I5.0 can effectively serve as KM enablers. This study examines how I5.0 affects KM, focusing on whether ERP systems can serve as technical enablers and integration platforms to improve enterprise operations and decision-making. Using a systematic literature review (SLR), we clarify core concepts of KM and I5.0, analyze I5.0’s impact on KM paradigms and ERP functionality. Upon these works, we propose a conceptual framework for the I5.0-integrated ERP as a KM integration platform. The findings bridge the integration gap among I5.0, KM, and ERP—offering scholars a testable research pathway and practitioners actionable guidance for KM system upgrades.