Productivity growth in manufacturing is stuck. Despite improvements in equipment, software and management approaches, annual labor productivity growth in the U.S. was around 0.7 percent between 2007 and 2018. In fact, there’s been zero net average productivity growth during the past five years.
Industry 4.0 promises to reignite productivity growth in manufacturing via connected machines, people, data and value chains. That was the conclusion of a 2019 study conducted by Deloitte and the Manufacturer’s Alliance for Productivity and Innovation (MAPI).