The Global Lighthouse Network is a World Economic Forum initiative cofounded with McKinsey. It examines the future of operations and considers how Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) technologies are shaping production. This growing community of organizations is setting the trends of the future with their use of digital and analytics tools across the value chain to drive growth and productivity, improve resilience, and deliver environmental sustainability.
January 2025—AI innovation powers productivity
Eighteen innovative sites have received awards from the Global Lighthouse Network, expanding the community to 189 leading production facilities and value chains that harness digital technologies at scale to drive next-generation operational performance, environmental sustainability, and frontline talent development.
The latest cohort of 13 Fourth Industrial Revolution and five Sustainability Lighthouses span ten places: China, Germany, India, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, the United States, and newcomer Morocco, home to the first Lighthouse site on the African continent. This diverse group is united by their shared commitment to holistic performance excellence and will leverage the Global Lighthouse Network as a platform for exchanging best practices across industries.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is evolving at an unprecedented pace, transforming industries and redefining the possibilities of modern production. Amid this rapid evolution, Lighthouses have cracked the code on implementation. In the most recent cohort, 77 percent of the top five use cases across all Lighthouses were enabled by analytical AI, and 9 percent leverage generative AI. Lighthouses have found impact, while others are still exploring potential because they apply a proven playbook. They focus on a “value back” approach, investing in foundational capabilities and partnering with front lines for localized engagement and adoption.
In an era where industrial activities contribute to 30 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, the urgency to bridge the gap between sustainability commitment and action has never been more important. Lighthouses are responding to supply chain risk and demands for life cycle sustainability by taking a hard look at their product portfolios and value chain stewardship. They are deploying advanced approaches to enhance agility, resilience, and sustainability, including data platforms for comprehensive visibility and intelligence, tools for rapid product design, and circularity solutions to reduce life cycle emissions.
For the value chains flowing through Lighthouse sites, these approaches have delivered 50 percent reductions in new-product-introduction times, 30 to 50 percent reductions in Scope 1 and 2 emissions, an average 30 percent reduction in material waste, and a 25 percent reduction in energy and water consumption.
The Global Lighthouse Network is a World Economic Forum initiative. The initiative was cofounded with McKinsey & Company and is counseled by an advisory board of industry leaders who are working together to shape the future of global manufacturing. The advisory board includes Foxconn Industrial Internet, Johnson & Johnson, Koç Holding, McKinsey & Company, Schneider Electric, and Siemens. Sites and value chains that join the network are designated by an independent panel of experts.
Dinu de Kroon is a partner in McKinsey’s Zurich office; Enno de Boer is a senior partner in McKinsey’s New Jersey office; and Rahul Shahani is a partner in the New York office, where Sydney Alabaster, a platform fellow at the World Economic Forum, is a consultant.
October 2024—Driving value with generative AI
The Global Lighthouse Network continues to grow, adding 22 organizations to its number since the last cohort joined in December 2023. This expands the community to 172 leading production facilities and value chains that harness digital technologies at scale to drive next-generation operational excellence, environmental sustainability, and workforce development.
The latest cohort of 19 Fourth Industrial Revolution and three Sustainability Lighthouses spans ten countries: China, the Czech Republic, Germany, India, Mexico, Singapore, Sweden, and Türkiye, and for the first time, Switzerland and Vietnam. This diverse group is united by their shared commitment to innovative 4IR technologies and will leverage the Global Lighthouse Network as a platform for exchanging best practices across industries.
These new Lighthouses prove that AI and other 4IR technologies not only drive business value but also enhance sustainability and workforce engagement. At a time when many organizations are seeking solutions for performance, environmental, and frontline challenges while struggling to capture AI’s full potential, this latest cohort is lighting the way. They are pioneering the integration of advanced technologies to achieve comprehensive objectives, from operational efficiency to environmental stewardship.
Dinu de Kroon is a partner in McKinsey’s Zurich office; Enno de Boer is a senior partner in McKinsey’s New Jersey office; and Rahul Shahani is a partner in the New York office, where Sydney Alabaster, a platform fellow at the World Economic Forum, is a consultant.
December 2023—The leading edge of production
By Henry Bristol, Enno de Boer, and Rahul Shahani
The Global Lighthouse Network has grown almost tenfold since its inception, from 16 to 153 Lighthouses. Each is recognized for its leadership in leveraging advanced technologies and strategies to drive growth, improve resilience, and deliver environmental sustainability. Ninety-nine are Factory Lighthouses, driving transformations within the four walls of a particular production site, while 54 are End-to-End (E2E) lighthouses, deploying technologies for impact across their value chains. And 17 of those are also Sustainability Lighthouses, demonstrating exemplary use of technology for emissions, waste, and water reduction.
In December 2023, the Network is welcoming a cohort of 21 Lighthouses, 16 of which are Factory Lighthouses and five of which are E2E Value Chain Lighthouses. In addition, four Sustainability Lighthouses have been recognized for their outstanding use of technology to reduce their environmental footprint on top of their prior Lighthouse designations.
These latest additions offer a glimpse into the future of advanced manufacturing and value chains; together, they comprise the leading edge of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The main trends among them include an unprecedented level of digital maturity, the rapid proliferation of machine intelligence, and transformation programs that execute at-scale deployments from the outset.
Henry Bristol is a consultant in McKinsey’s Dallas office, as well as a platform fellow at the World Economic Forum; Enno de Boer is a senior partner in the New Jersey office; and Rahul Shahani is a partner based in New York.
January 2023—The scaling imperative continues
By Francisco Betti, Enno de Boer, Vincent Desnos, and Yves Giraud
The second chapter of the Fourth Industrial Revolution continues amid global disruption, marked by the increasing impact of climate change, inflation, soaring energy prices, supply chain volatility, and talent shortages. Confronting these challenges successfully requires manufacturers to meet a new scaling imperative not only within their own networks but also in collaboration up and down the entire value chain.
It’s known that for any production network to succeed economically and sustainably, it must succeed both locally and globally. Members of the Global Lighthouse Network have crystallized how 4IR technology and working models can help companies succeed at both levels while being more resilient to a future reshuffling of production networks.
The newest members of the Global Lighthouse Network—bringing the total to more than 130—are engaging in transformation at scale, building and maintaining momentum.
Enno de Boer is a senior partner in McKinsey’s New Jersey office; Vincent Desnos is an expert in the Lyon office; and Yves Giraud is a senior expert in the Geneva office and a platform fellow at the World Economic Forum. Francisco Betti is head of advanced manufacturing and value chains at the World Economic Forum and a member of its executive committee.
October 2022—Opening the second chapter of the Fourth Industrial Revolution
By Francisco Betti, Enno de Boer, Vincent Desnos, and Yves Giraud
The newest members of the Global Lighthouse Network—11 new sites and four new sustainability lighthouses—are the embodiment of the success of this approach to deliver scaling as a new chapter of the Fourth Industrial Revolution begins.
Their stories reflect dramatic performance and sustainability improvements that reflect not only shrewd deployments of technology, but also a consistent focus on developing people’s skills and building the strategy and governance to support scalability. The following are among the highlights:
- Reducing resource use by more than one-third while more than tripling factory throughput
- Raising efficiency by more than 10 percent, cutting greenhouse-gas emissions in half, raising and at the same time improving quality—and in so doing, becoming the transformation template for a network of more than three dozen plants
- Raising quality by 300 percent while reducing cost by more than 20 percent and emissions by more than one-quarter—for increased resilience in the face of inflationary pressure on inputs and erosion of pricing leverage
- Increasing customer satisfaction and employee engagement while reducing material losses by more than three-quarters—and establishing a 4IR-enabled circular economy for electronic waste, enhancing long-term competitiveness
These breakthroughs illustrate that even at the Global Lighthouse Network, the opportunity and urgency for manufacturers to take action is growing even more quickly. The 114 Lighthouses provide a starting point for others to follow.
