Digitizing is on top of many agendas as one solution to industrial problems and in realizing Industry 4.0. By digitizing production one can achieve process efficiency and flexibility as well as resource effectiveness throughout the whole life cycle. The smart factory of tomorrow is characterized by adaptive and self-regulating cyber-physical and real-time connected systems. However, without a clear purpose, and without taking advantage of all the intellectual as well as material resources in the industry, it will risk becoming a fad like many others. Smart IT solutions must be combined with smart people and a smart approach to digitizing. The focus should be on optimizing the maintenance throughout the asset lifetime and  on matching digitalization efforts with suitable maintenance strategies based on the needs of the operations. The basic idea behind the concept of “The thinking industry” is to see upon the future with a system’s perspective based on the motto “think hard, think right, think system(atically)”. This paper describes the concept of “The thinking industry” and how it supports the digitizing of maintenance. Moreover, a general work process is proposed and exemplified.