Even in the age of Industry 4.0, traditional rubber processing is still strongly craftsmanship oriented. Detecting material outside of a defined specification level as early as possible significantly reduces the carbon footprint of the subsequent moulded part, meaning that the energy-intensive rubber processing industry can tap into far-reaching savings potential in terms of raw materials and primary energy by digitally monitoring and controlling the processing steps. The aim of the MaterialDigital 1-3 projects DigitRubber, InSuKa and DIPONI is to digitally map the entire rubber life cycle and to develop an AI-controlled system that operates the entire continuous manufacturing process at the optimum quality level. The basis for this is the MaterialDigital 1 project DigitRubber, in which a rubber-specific ontology and a database-supported AI-control of the “mixing-milling-extruding” process and a digital twin of the vulcanization process in the autoclave were developed for the first time. In addition, there is the intelligent search engine (“INSUKA app”) developed in the INSUKA project, which suggests suitable rubber compounds and processing conditions (machine and process parameters) based on a material database in order to provide qualified predictions of their mechanical properties. DIPONI completes the digitalization of the product life cycle by adding the continuous vulcanization process step and also addresses waste avoidance and the recycling of end-of-life articles. The purely quality-related control AI is expanded on the digital level with profitability data (production planning and control, ESG data). This creates an additional meta-level (“business AI”) that shows a company's decision-makers not only technically relevant quality criteria but also the economic component. The overarching goal of these research projects is to provide the manufacturing rubber industry with a measurement chain that is as fully digitalized as possible and can be used as a demonstrator to evaluate the internal potential of digitalization.