The Growing Imperative to Build Leadership in Fourth Industrial Revolution

With lockdown in Shenzen tech hub in China and  shipping disruptions arising from Russia’s attack on Ukraine, some of us have lost hope that we will ever receive that new phone, webcam, or car that we ordered during the Covid pandemic, and have patiently waited for months. This situation is not an outcome just recent events, but a culmination of series of events that led to contrasting developments in the US corporate sector in the last forty years. On one hand, US created undisputed leadership in digital technologies, epitomized by the rise of Google (Alphabet), Microsoft, Facebook (Meta), Apple, and Amazon, whose combined market capitalizations exceeds GDPs of all nations except two.  On the other hand, the fortunes of US manufacturing sectors declined dramatically, so much so, that manufacturing has largely left US shores. Today, US’s largest imports include cars, computers, and phones, all of which were initially discovered, prototyped, and produced in the US. Much of manufacturing has gone to China, with whom US now has the largest trade deficit. Read the rest on California Management Review.