Future-Proofing Global Value Chains: Country Preparedness and Beyond

Case studies

Total number of case studies

299

Sectors

21

Locations

59

Topics

9

Kenvue Thailand deployed Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies for more sustainable resource management across site operations. This includes an end-to-end water-to-ecosystem performance management system, a digital twin to optimize chiller system energy consumption, and a dynamic scheduling and container loading optimization solution that leverages data analytics and robotic process automation. From 2018 to 2023, the site reduced water utility intake by 35%, energy-related consumption (scope 1&2) by 34%, correlating GHG emissions by 29%, normalized for production volumes, and container utilization improved by 35% leading to more efficient transportation.
Thailand | Health
Kenvue - Bangkok - Sustainability
Schneider Electric’s Hyderabad site aims to be zero carbon on Scope 1 and 2 by 2030, based on a strong Fourth Industrial Revolution core. This includes an E2E closed-loop system with CO2 tracking for strategic suppliers. The system is powered by real-time data generation and cloud analytics for all facility assets that interlink with shop-floor operations using an IIoT-enabled equalizer and AI-based predictive monitoring. This has led to a 59% reduction in energy consumption, 61% decrease in CO2 emissions, 57% cut in water consumption and a 64% reduction in normalized waste generation.
India | Technology
Schneider Electric - Hyderabad - Sustainability
To become a zero-carbon pioneer in the context of 92% growth in production output in the past three years, Siemens’ Chengdu factory deployed a holistic digital energy management system, implemented predictive maintenance throughout the manufacturing process, introduced AI-based automation to identify and handle up to 16 types of production waste and applied eco-design features to improve circularity and dematerialization. This has reduced unit product energy consumption by 24% and production waste by 48%.
People's Republic of China | Technology
Siemens - Chengdu - Sustainability
The challengeHSBC is one of the world's largest banking and financial services organizations. With some 4,400 offices, we serve around 46 million customers through our four global businesses: Retail Banking and Wealth Management, Commercial Banking, Global Banking and Markets, and Global Private Banking. Facing into the challenge of building the skills we need for the future, we wanted to enable our 220,000+ employees located across more than 60 countries, with the skills they need for the roles they hold today and for the future. We also needed to engage colleagues around internal mobility opportunities, in pursuit of the most critical skills needed for the Bank. Our key objectives were to:• Enable a dynamic workforce where talent and skills are quickly aligned with the work that needs to get done.• Empower employees to take ownership of their own development, feeling motivated and relevant as the bank delivers on its strategic objectives.• Open up opportunities across the Bank by extending access to skill and learning experiences for our people beyond their immediate team.• Secure greater insights into the skills we have and those we need, driving informed action to bridge any gaps.• Leverage the power of our global network, unlocking capacity as managers source skills and time from across the workforce to support part-time projects.The action takenThe implementation of our Talent Marketplace was key to deliver on these objectives. The platform uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to connect colleagues with networking and part-time project opportunities based on their skills, experiences, and aspirations. The platform was deployed in phases and is live to all employees this year.The implementation of the Talent Marketplace formed part of a wider Future Skills movement, which included the implementation of a global learning experience platform (Degreed), a new curriculum, and mobilization of a global Influencer Network. Skills are increasingly seen as key currency in the workforce, and using AI, our Talent Marketplace encourages networking and part-time project opportunities by connecting colleagues, based on the skills individuals have and want to develop, rather than current job role, grade, or business area. At the same time, managers get better insights into their team’s skillsets and where development might be needed, as well as immediate access to a global pool of talent.Talent Marketplace enabled a skills-based approach to connecting colleagues and creating opportunities and we can now match supply with demand of skills in a way that is transparent, digitized and at scale.As employees interact with the Talent Marketplace, the AI learns and improves its understanding of their preferences and suggests opportunities that are better suited. As project owners review and make decisions on candidates, the AI also better understands what requirements are needed and adapts. The AI has helped bridge the gap between human intervention with its powerful skills-based matching engine and learning capability. “I was able to get a resource within a day, which normally takes months to identify. The exciting part is that we can access talent from across HSBC and are not restricted to our Global Businesses or Global Functions." user soundbiteThe impact Whereas traditionally individuals have searched out opportunities based on role title, domain or department, the Talent Marketplace’s ability to match based on skill, means it is able to surface opportunities that an individual may never have found on their own. Integration with Degreed means that we can better close the feedback loop for people who want to develop and grow their skills. For example, where they are unsuccessful being matched to an opportunity, the platform will connect them to Degreed to undertake additional learning or access relevant content.Benefits for individualsEmployees are empowered to own their development and gain skills and experiences in different and fulfilling ways.Employees can build a wider professional network for the future, by collaborating and meeting people outside their immediate team. Individuals can make more informed decisions about their future career by taking part in short term projects and developing skills on the job.Employees can showcase their hidden talents, benefiting not only the individual but also HSBC.Benefits for leaders and teamsLeaders have quick and easy access to relevant talent and skills from across HSBC.Freed up capacity across teams and increase in unlocked hours - when employees take on part-time project opportunities.Engages and helps to retain top talent by giving employees confidence they can fulfil their career and development goals at HSBC. Enables teams to plug skills gaps while bringing fresh perspectives and energy into the team.Case StudyA colleague Greg in M&S Bank, UK was looking to build his network – he used Talent Marketplace to connect with another colleague, Kate, working in our Wealth and Private Banking business who was looking for support with a web project. Kate needed support with an internal Future of Work initiative and needed someone with web design skills for the UK Test and Learn Hub.​Gregg then used TMP to find someone with the skills Kate needed and within 24 hours, 12 people from across the globe registered interest in the project.​TMP helped Gregg build his network and gain experience outside of his business area; and the successful candidate shared their web design skills to create a new digital hub. 
HSBC: Providing Upskilling and Reskilling Opportunities for our Employees
The challenge The Allianz Group is one of the world’s leading insurers and asset managers, with private and corporate customers in nearly 70 countries. Enabling cross-border remote work for private reasons is important to Allianz because it reflects changing priorities in today’s work environment and is particularly relevant to the well-being of our employees and future talents.  Working remotely from outside the country of employment is quite complex, being subject to different regulations and conventions between countries. The main issue that companies face when allowing employees to work remotely abroad is ensuring full compliance with both the country of employment and the chosen destination and avoid legal and financial risks for both the employer and the employee. Many organizations are not allowing abroad remote work simply because the required assessment of the regulatory implications, such as taxation, immigration, and social security aspects is too time-consuming or expensive. Allianz has over 156,000 employees globally. There are countless possible country combinations for cross-border work, and in addition to the country of employment and the destination, an employee’s nationality, job role, personal situation, and the duration of the stay are all additional factors affecting compliance.  The action taken Allianz’s goal was to find a solution that would address the multiple risks of cross-border remote work and ensure full transborder compliance in an easy, fast, and cost-efficient way.  Allianz decided to develop in-house a highly innovative, data-based, automated solution to solve this complex problem globally. The assessment tool pools all available data for a fully automated approval process, considering relevant taxation, social security, immigration, and other risks. The tool features a self-service platform that determines employees’ eligibility to work from the country of their choice within minutes. By merely answering six basic questions, employees receive an immediate response.  The simplicity and intuitiveness of the tool are unique in the industry. The Allianz Cross-Border Remote Work Tool cuts through the confusion of the wide variety of legal and tax requirements of different countries by instantly analysing the key inputs of employees and ensuring a compliant approval. The “future-readiness” of the solution rests on the tool's ability to grow its database with every employee request presenting new country combinations, job functions, regulatory changes, and other factors, thereby constantly increasing the processing automation of requests.  “As our lives and the world around us become increasingly more international, many of us have friends, family, and previous life experience scattered across various parts of the world. Being able to work abroad for private reasons - from home or from anywhere - is highly appreciated by employees, and we are happy to have developed an innovative solution that makes this possible and easy to handle.” - Olaf Kliesow, Head of Global Reward, Performance and Mobility   The outcome While automation was easiest at first within the EU, it is progressively expanding to include the Americas and countries in Africa and Asia. Allianz is constantly improving the tool and making it even more user-friendly on the basis of employee feedback.  Allianz has fully embraced the flexibility of hybrid working. It offers employees globally a minimum of 40% mobile working, and more – depending on local business needs, including the eligibility to work from abroad for private reasons for up to 25 working days per year.By the end of 2025, circa 60% of the workforce (circa 98,000 employees) had access to the tool, which is further being rolled out across the Allianz group.By the end of December 2025, 29,597 applications had been submitted, of which 24,391 were approved.In Germany, over 73% of requests are handled automatically by the tool, and a vast majority are instantly granted. The Allianz Cross-Border Remote Work Tool received two EMEA Expatriate Management and Mobility Awards (one for ‘Best Employee Experience and Engagement’ and one for ‘Most Innovative Use of Technology in Global Mobility’) as well as the HR Excellence Award for ‘Hybrid & Remote Work’.  The learnings This outcome would not have been possible without the full backing of our Board of Management, who support the Allianz hybrid work model allowing a high degree of flexibility and evolving according to the changing needs of our international workforce. In order to be able to develop inhouse an efficient solution to a complex set of problems, it was essential to ensure the collaboration of experts of different departments.For a solution that is easy to use and saves time and capacity, it is important to maximize automation. This requires pooling all available data and ensuring the solution is dynamic, i.e., that the tool’s “brain” grows with every new employee request and country combination. And the data must be made available for regular internal and external audits.Our solution also requires a “back office” team that handles new cases not covered by automation (new country combinations and other factors) and feeds the tool with these new data to constantly increase automation for future requests.Ensuring simplicity and constantly improving user experience should be an integral part of the approach. It is also important to adapt the offer to changing employee needs.
Allianz: Solving the Complexities of Cross-Border Working
The challengeNovo Nordisk is a global healthcare company, founded in 1923 and headquartered just outside of Copenhagen, Denmark. The company employs more than 50,000 people in 80 offices around the world and markets its products in 170 countries.At Novo Nordisk, the business is built around its clear purpose: "Driving change to defeat diabetes and other serious chronic diseases." Novo Nordisk's key contribution is to discover and develop innovative medicines and make them accessible to patients throughout the world.Diversity and inclusion can help realize this ambition by enabling a diverse line of thought, increasing innovation, leading to better and more nuanced decisions and stronger risk management.For Novo Nordisk, diversity is about the mix of employees, perspectives, and backgrounds of employees in the business, and inclusion is about creating a culture where all employees feel valued and have a sense of belonging.Novo Nordisk acknowledges that gender is just one aspect of diversity and that diversity encompasses any dimension that distinguishes employees and facilitates a broad range of perspectives. This includes aspects such as ethnicity, race, age, nationality, disability status, and sexual orientation. However, due to legal limitations, Novo Nordisk presently lacks consistent global metrics for all aspects of diversity.At the end of 2020, despite many great initiatives and programs promoting Diversity & Inclusion at Novo Nordisk, there was still scope for improvement in terms of gender diversity. The primary obstacle to achieving gender diversity is the underrepresentation of women in senior leadership positions. In 2020, the percentage of women in senior leadership positions was 35%, which is only slightly higher than in previous years (At Novo Nordisk, Senior leadership typically includes Senior VP's and corporate VP's). “To be clear, we are not happy with our current state. That is why we’ve introduced aspirational targets focused on creating an inclusive culture and achieving gender balance.” Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, President and CEO, Novo Nordisk.The action takenIn August 2021, the Executive Management committed to a set of diversity and inclusion targets for Novo Nordisk, with the belief that this will ensure leadership accountability and drive transformational change. These targets include: For Novo Nordisk, gender balance is defined as the range between 45%-55% to leave up to 10% flexibility for women and men while also allowing for non-binary gender, recognizing that some employees may not wish to be categorized.To arrive at the 45% figure, a forecasting model was developed, which included the previous five years' average turnover and the average share of women in the inflow and outflow of senior leaders. Based on different scenarios of the future share of women among senior leaders, the company found that an aspirational target of achieving a minimum of 45% women and 45% men in senior leadership positions by the end of 2025 was both ambitious and realistic.The company acknowledged that additional actions are necessary to drive sustainable change in Diversity and Inclusion, and therefore identified three key drivers to focus on:1. Holding leaders accountable: Novo Nordisk expects all its leaders to embrace their role as inclusive leaders by being committed to building diverse teams of complementary strengths, valuing diverse skills, experiences and perspectives, and creating psychological safety for employees.The company recognises that diversity and inclusion opportunities are different depending on the local context and societies we serve. Therefore, to drive impact at the local level and to hold leaders accountable for driving progress, all senior leaders are expected to define local focus areas and action plans.This is further affirmed by the progress on D&I being anchored in the Short-term and Long-term incentive programs for senior leaders.2. Embedding D&I in the employee life cycleTo mitigate bias, Novo Nordisk continuously reviews its processes and policies at every stage of the employee experience, including recruitment, compensation, and paid leave. When recruiting, leaders are expected to build teams of complementary strengths. To make this ambition a reality, the company strives to ensure a diverse panel in its recruitment processes, as well as a diverse slate of candidates. Furthermore, the leaders at the company is continuously challenging themselves regarding assumptions about what is needed for a position.To tackle pay equity, equal pay reviews are conducted annually, resulting in mitigating actions being taken where pay gaps are identified.To create a more inclusive environment for all genders, Novo Nordisk has offered a minimum of eight weeks of paid leave to non-birthing parents, regardless of where they work, from 2022 onwards. The policy applies to any employee with a parental responsibility through birth or adoption and is aimed at ensuring all employees have the opportunity to bond with their child within the first 12 months.Lastly, the company ensures a strong pipeline of diverse talents by embedding D&I in its succession management and talent programs.3. TransparencyNovo Nordisk uses data and metrics to track the progress of D&I initiatives and to create transparency and accountability for its leaders and employees. In addition to employee representation data, the company also measures the state of inclusion at Novo Nordisk using its global “Inclusion Index”. The “Inclusion Index” is a numerical indicator of how employees rate the state of inclusion in Novo Nordisk, based on four statements around belonging, equal opportunities, and psychological safety. Each leader gets a unique inclusion index for the team to benchmark itself against the business unit and the company, and address team challenges.Additionally, all leaders can access pay insights through the Equal Pay Dashboard, which identifies potential pay biases in the employee life cycle, helping to prevent pay gaps and reduce response time. By regularly analyzing these metrics, the company has been able to identify areas for improvement and make data-driven decisions to foster a more inclusive workplace culture.In addition to utilizing these metrics, Novo Nordisk releases an internal D&I progress report that features success stories and knowledge gained from various parts of the organization. The aim is to promote transparency and cultivate a feeling of working towards a common objective.“Being inclusive should be lived out through action – and how we operate our businesses – everywhere, each and every day.” Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, President and CEO, The outcomeNovo Nordisk has made significant strides since introducing its aspirational targets in August 2021, notably in achieving greater gender balance across all managerial levels, inclusion and sustainable pay. The share of women among senior leaders increased from 35% at the introduction of the target to 39% 18 months later. At the current rate, the company is on track to achieve the 45% target by 2025.Of Novo Nordisk's 39,127 employees who completed the survey in 2022, 82% rated the inclusion statements favorable, compared to 78% in 2021, signifying a 4% increase in the Inclusion Index from 2021 to 2022.Out of the 43,000 positions[1] covered in the annual pay review in 2022, Novo Nordisk identified 0.6% with an equal pay gap[2], corrective action is being taken on the identified pay gap. [1] Excluding some populations and locations due to local regulations such as in the US where a local process is in place[2] “Equal Pay gap” is defined as the employee’s pay being significantly above or below the expected pay given the employee’s job level, tenure, job family and other parametersThe learningsTargets alone don't drive change, subsequent actions are also needed. It is important to recognize that diversity and inclusion opportunities differ depending on the local context and societies served.Leadership commitment to the D&I agenda is key. Both, to role model inclusive behaviours and to build diverse teams.Companies can only unlock the full potential of its workforce by embracing an inclusive and diverse culture representative of the patients, customers, and societies it serves.___________________________________“It all starts with inclusion – and inclusive leaders who make people feel safe to speak up and show up – as their true selves – each and every day. With that, our company becomes stronger. Our business performance will be stronger. We will be more holistic in the way we look at things. And we will better reflect the societies we serve.” Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, President and CEO, Novo Nordisk
Novo Nordisk: Making Inclusivity a Reality
Facing the demand of customers for customized design, fast delivery and high quality, Haier refrigerator factory leverages big data, digital twin and advanced visual inspection technology to accelerate R&D, upgrade manufacturing process and logistics scheduling mode . The order response lead time has been shortened by 35%, production efficiency has been increased by 35% and quality performance has been improved by 36%.
People's Republic of China | Other
Haier - Qingdao / Refrigerators
To address the challenges from industryspecific market cycle fluctuations, product complexity (263 SKUs) and production of heavy duty products, Sany Changsha leveraged flexible automation, AI and IIoT at scale to build a digital and flexible heavy equipment manufacturing system that excels at cost, efficiency and quality. As a result, the site expanded capacity by 123%, improved labor productivity by 98%, and reduced unit manufacturing cost by 29%.
People's Republic of China | Technology
Sany Group Co. Ltd - Changsha
Ballina site, the company’s largest concentrate manufacturing facility, delivers over 3,500 SKUs to 68 countries. To enable growth, build resilience and address increasing portfolio complexity, the site implemented digital, and analytics use cases. As a result, it improved cost by 16% while expanding its SKU portfolio by 30%, and led Fourth Industrial Revolution scaling across the network of 17 sites.This greenfield factory is a product of the Arçelik use caseThis greenfield factory is a product of the Arçelik use case
Ireland | Food & agriculture
The Coca-Cola Company - Ballina
Following the establishment of a plant in the US two years ago to be closer to customers, LG encountered various human resource risks and a lack of production know-how. By adopting Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies, such as deep learning, automation and digitalization, LG was able to strengthen its strategic production base in the US, increasing sales by 68% and growing net profit by 703%.
USA | Other
LG Electronics - Clarksville
With cost leadership being critical to compete as a SME in a highly competitive commodity market, MantaMESH developed a Fourth Industrial Revolution an online manufacturing business model that connects customers to an automated fulfilment system. All customer interactions are automatically processed online with real-time connection to smart manufacturing plants. The result is a 261% increase in customer activity and 73% growth in production volumes while reducing energy consumption/kg produced by 32%.
Germany | Other
MantaMESH - Frottstadt
To address a 2-3% year-on-year business growth with limited footprint expansion potential, the site implemented Fourth Industrial Revolution use cases such as data flow integration, digital twin, machine learning across end-to-end value chain (from R&D to customers). As a a result, the innovation lead time accelerated by 72%, shutdown days for trial were reduced by 21%, and order horizon from customers improved 14-fold.
Japan | Chemicals
Procter & Gamble - Takasaki
With 250% of annual growth rate, short technology transition pace of 18 months, and workforce challenges in Shanghai city, Western Digital Shanghai as a high-volume & high-mix semiconductor backend factory overcame these challenges by implementing diverse 4IR use cases such as automated product design system, machine learning based virtual wafer test, in house designed lights-out automation and intelligent planning system and have achieved 40% time to market reduction, 221% productivity improvement, 75% manufacturing lead time reduction and 62% product cost reduction
People's Republic of China | Technology
JCET | SanDisk - Shanghai
In response to customers’ needs for rapid releases of new smartphone products and strict quality standards, Foxconn Industrial Internet enabled agile product introduction, quick capacity ramp-up, and smart mass production by deploying 37 different Fourth Industrial Revolution use cases at scale. This accelerated new product introduction by 29%, led to 50% faster ramp-ups, reduced quality non-conformance by 56% and reduced manufacturing cost by 30%. 
People's Republic of China | Technology
Foxconn - Yuzhan
To capture greater market volumes, CEAT needed to incorporate greener materials and meet stringent in-process specifications. CEAT deployed Fourth Industrial Revolution use cases like advanced analytics to optimize cycle times and digitalization of operator’s touchpoints. As a result, the site reduced cycle times by 20%, process scrap by 46%, and energy consumption by 15% . Overall, this resulted in approximately a 2.5 times increase in export and OEM sales in two years.
India | Automotive
CEAT - Halol
To improve productivity and reduce lead time in an increasingly complex manufacturing environment of over 100 process steps, ASE Kaohsiung’s bumping factory deployed AI applications in their processes from inspection to dispatch. As a result, the site was able to increase output by 67% while reducing order lead time by 39%.
Taiwan, China | Technology
ASE - Kaohsiung
To secure future investments and resources for production of new products such as hydrogen components, Bosch Powertrain Solutions Plant in Bursa needed to further strengthen its cost leadership. By deploying AI use cases such as close loop process control for hydro-erosion, and upskilling 100% of the workforce, they reduced unit manufacturing cost by 9% and improved OEE by 9%.
Türkiye | Automotive
Bosch Automotive - Bursa
Facing challenges in product diversity, time-to-delivery and quality brought by the operational shift from within-group single supply to external broader supply, Haier factory in Hefei leveraged the self-developed IIoT platform to accelerate at-scale deployment of AI, machine vision and advanced analytics in 18 Fourth Industrial Revolution use cases across supply network, R&D, manufacturing and customer service, shortening order lead time by 50% and lowering on-site defect rate by 33%.
People's Republic of China | Other
Haier - Hefei
To respond to external challenges, such as 30% over-capacity and higher costs due to market volatility, the company has deployed 28 different Fourth Industrial Revolution use cases, such as machine-learning-enabled process optimization and AI-enabled safety management. As a result, labour productivity increased by 33%, conversion cost fell by 20%, energy consumption dropped 31%, and recordable safety incidents reached zero.
People's Republic of China | Chemicals
Huayi New Material - Shanghai
Facing a volatile demand in a highly fragmented and complex network of distributors and vendors, Kenvue India deployed Fourth Industrial Revolution solutions such as demand sensing, smart logistics, robotics and 3D printing. As a result, they reduced OTIF losses by 66%, accelerated new product introduction by 33% and improved cost per piece by 34%.
India | Health
Kenvue - Mulund

Future-Proofing Global Value Chains: Country Preparedness and Beyond

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