Growth in the generative AI era looks like a classic case of “two steps forward, one step back.” As companies come to grips with the unique complexities of gen AI, initial progress leads to reversals and redos, in some cases threatening to stop development altogether.There are many sources of frustration and delay, from a lack of sufficient talent to ongoing data quality issues. But our experience working closely with more…
Leaders worldwide are moving fast to deploy AI at scale. But scaling AI means more data centers—and data centers consume vast quantities of energy. On this episode of The McKinsey Podcast, McKinsey’s Jesse Noffsinger and Pankaj Sachdeva speak with Global Editorial Director Lucia Rahilly about what needs to happen to build new, bigger data centers quickly, as well as to sate these data centers’ growing hunger for power.The McKinsey Podcast is cohosted…
Tech debt and complex tech migrations have become major obstacles to successful digital transformations. These challenges stem from the fact that many organizations built their technology infrastructure on legacy systems from a different era. This prevents companies from adopting new technologies that would enable them to respond to fast-changing market trends and customer expectations. To overcome these limitations, many organizations are adopting composable tech stacks—a modern approach to building technology…
JPMorganChase is a global financial institution with $4 trillion in assets. With over 300,000 employees, the firm has long focused on collecting and leveraging data to better serve its millions of customers and clients. But in 2023, JPMorganChase embarked on a new data transformation journey. McKinsey Senior Partner Kevin Buehler recently sat down with Mark Birkhead, firmwide chief data officer, to hear more about how the firm is leveraging its…
For businesses to compete effectively and create value, they need to be fast, flexible, and focused on the customer. This has put technology center stage at many businesses and heralds the new dawn of the tech officer as a strategic partner to the business. But what business users and customers see in technology, argues Deb Hall Lefevre, CTO for Starbucks Coffee Company, is often not what matters most in the…
India’s $580 billion to $650 billion agriculture sector is at a strategic juncture. A combination of external tailwinds and internal momentum—driven by factors ranging from structural reforms to digital and technological innovation—has propelled India to emerge as one of the world’s largest and fastest-growing agricultural economies. As agricultural supply chains become increasingly interconnected, India’s scale as an agricultural producer and exporter positions it as a critical player in the shifting…
The healthcare ecosystem is highly complex, often leaving patients frustrated with their experiences and sometimes unable to access the care they need when they need it. So what can be done? In the latest episode of the McKinsey on Healthcare podcast, senior partner Drew Ungerman, global leader of McKinsey’s social, healthcare, and public sector entities work and global coleader of the McKinsey Health Institute, shares his thoughts on the intersection…
Materials value chains are complex and span the entire globe, and they represent 20 percent of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. To reach net-zero targets, the world is undergoing a materials transition in tandem with the ongoing energy and mobility transitions. Organizations around the world are making net-zero and circularity pledges to support this transition and decarbonize. Increasingly, consumers and governments are championing regulations and policies that promote a circular…
It’s easy for a start-up culture to survive in a new corporate venture that comprises just a handful of like-minded people. But when corporate ventures grow to hundreds or even thousands of people, the culture can break down. To avoid this outcome, the venture’s leaders can systematically build and maintain a healthy culture that takes the unique corporate context into account. The cost of not doing so can be high.…
According to CEO and Managing Director T. V. Narendran, Tata Steel has been actively pursuing environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ideals since its establishment in 1907. For instance, founder J. N. Tata did not want the company to replicate the problems English laborers experienced during the industrial development of the 1800s, so he built workers’ accommodations close to steel factories. In the 1920s, Tata Steel instituted an eight-hour workday, introduced…
Europe’s technology ecosystem stands at a turning point. While this ecosystem has matured significantly over the past decade, persistent structural barriers—fragmented markets, conservative corporate norms, and a slower flow of late-stage capital relative to early-stage investment—continue to constrain the region’s ability to scale global champions. However, a rare alignment of geopolitical, regulatory, and technological shifts is creating new momentum and, with it, a window to build global leadership. This report…
To millennials and Gen Zers, wellness has become a daily, personalized practice rather than a set of occasional activities or purchases. As this shift takes hold, it’s influencing the direction of the $2 trillion global wellness industry, which is expanding beyond its core categories. Even though younger demographics may be pushing the industry forward, older consumers, too, are becoming more interested in an expanding definition of wellness. In our fourth…
Every year, millions of tourists flock to Italy to take in cultural sites and, of course, shop. Italy is home to major global fashion brands and storied craftsmanship, playing a critical role in the global fashion industry. There may be high foot traffic on Via Montenapoleone in Milan or Via Tornabuoni in Florence, but the Italian fashion sector nevertheless faces several challenges, some of which are homegrown, while others are…
Most CEOs recognize the transformation opportunities inherent in an M&A transaction. As we’ve noted previously, the deal can be a catalyst for reimagining the strategy of the combined business; identifying and pursuing new sources of value; enhancing operations, or the way the business executes on its strategy; and attracting and developing new talent and capabilities. Of those four opportunities, the last one—the talent factor—holds perhaps the most promise in terms of…
Advertising is the industry that won’t sit still. Over the past three decades, the industry has morphed again and again. Brands once reached people primarily through mass media like TV, print, and radio, gaining precious few consumer insights. The internet changed all that with targeted and interactive campaigns online. More recently, retail media networks (RMNs) helped retailers enter the media business. Leveraging shopper and transaction data, RMNs help brands reach prospective…
Medtech companies are at the forefront of healthcare innovation, developing life-changing devices and solutions to help clinicians diagnose diseases earlier, perform interventions more precisely, and monitor patient health more effectively. Innovations such as minimally invasive surgical robots, AI-powered diagnostic imaging, and connected diabetes management systems have transformed patient care. As the industry emerges from a period of margin compression and dampened multiples, AI, enhanced by gen AI, can play a…
Quick wins alone can’t solve long-term problems. For instance, as anyone who has tried to get healthier can attest, cutting calories can be a good first step, but making comprehensive changes in diet and exercise is most critical to achieving lasting results. The financial-services industry provides another example. Like other industries, it has experienced increased instability over the past decade. To address long-standing cost challenges, many financial-services companies have responded…
Scams, fraud, and abuse are an increasingly difficult problem for the payments industry. In this episode of Talking Banking Matters, David Excell, the founder of Featurespace, speaks with McKinsey partner and payments industry expert Grace Klopcic about how the company got its start in the gaming and sports betting world, and why it uses machine learning rather than a complex set of rules to understand consumer behavior and quickly identify…
Throughout 2024, the US dairy industry experienced numerous operational headwinds. Reduced herd sizes, inflation, and ongoing labor challenges put pressure on volume, prices, and costs across the dairy value chain, and in March 2024, avian influenza was discovered in North American cows. These challenges have evolved in 2025, and shifting international trade policies have added more unknowns.But the news hasn’t been all bad. Consumers increasingly choose dairy, driving overall volume…
Companies are now turning to building new businesses to fuel innovation and open new revenue sources. Half of CEOs surveyed in the fifth annual McKinsey Global Survey on new-venture building view the development of new businesses as one of their top three strategic priorities, and 90 percent of investors advocate for increased or maintained new-business-building investments. Furthermore, according to other McKinsey research, new ventures are expected to drive over half…
There’s been a growing gap between air travel demand and the aviation industry’s supply of new aircraft to meet it. While passenger demand has rebounded from pandemic-era lows and is projected to keep growing, delivery times for newly manufactured aircraft—and maintenance turnaround times for aircraft in existing fleets—have slowed. What are the implications of this aircraft shortage for key stakeholders along the aviation value chain? What future scenarios are possible?…
For many large medtech companies, scale and diversification were intended to drive innovation and efficiency. Large, diversified companies in other industries have delivered superior shareholder returns by rationalizing fixed costs, mobilizing their balance sheets, and building broad-based relationships with customers. But while many large medtechs are among the industry’s most profitable, their diversification has not brought the same improvements in shareholder value as in other industries (Exhibit 1). Diversification has…
Airlines are often categorized into groups differentiated by their business models—in particular, their cost structures and revenue approaches: Legacy carriers (also known as full-service airlines) tend to offer multiclass cabins and a wide range of amenities, with many service features included in the ticket price. Examples include American Airlines, British Airways, and Cathay Pacific. Low-cost carriers and ultra-low-cost carriers—a combined group known as (U)LCCs—tend to sell discounted base-fare tickets and…
In 2020, CG Power and Industrial Solutions, an Indian multinational in the motor, power systems, and railway industries, was on the brink of bankruptcy. Plagued by a host of challenges, the company clearly needed a transformation to survive. Under the leadership of Natarajan Srinivasan, CG Power experienced a remarkable turnaround. Once a company teetering on the brink of collapse, CG Power has now seen a significant rise in its stock…
M &A activity is down, as is private equity investment, and companies are facing a range of new geopolitical tensions. Still, there is a path to growth through M&A for those companies that maintain an active acquisition strategy, understand their capabilities, and avoid certain assets, says McKinsey Senior Partner Jake Henry. On this episode of The McKinsey Podcast, he and McKinsey Senior Partner Mieke Van Oostende join McKinsey Editorial Director Roberta Fusaro…
Airline planning is inherently challenging, in part because many planning inputs are outside an airline’s control. The global aviation ecosystem relies on interwoven networks shaped by competing stakeholder priorities. Travel demand patterns are forever shifting and tough to forecast. Unpleasant surprises—including major storms, airport infrastructure breakdowns, IT failures, ground staff shortages, and aircraft delivery delays—can add significant uncertainty to any projections. This can be further exacerbated by global crises, geopolitical…
Running an airline isn’t for the timid. Weather events, infrastructure failures, and fickle passenger demand can make an already-tough business even more challenging. As this article goes to publication, economic uncertainty and geopolitical tension are both threatening to alter travel flows, piling yet more stress on airline executives. These business challenges show up on ledger sheets. Since 2005, we’ve analyzed the financial performance of the aviation value chain. Our research demonstrates…
McKinsey: How has Europe’s TMT sector performed compared to the United States and Asia? Ruben Schaubroeck: It’s no secret that Europe has lagged behind both America and Asia over the past years, and looking at different metrics, you can see that. If you look at, for example, total TMT market capitalization, Europe’s share has dropped from 30 percent to 7 percent, which represents an $8 trillion loss. Secondly, if you…
The healthcare industry has long been a leader when it comes to women’s representation in the workforce. It has proved to be an attractive destination for the roughly 40 percent of US STEM college graduates who are women. In fact, in the United States, nursing is the largest healthcare profession, and 88 percent of nurses are women. And while women in healthcare have found it tough to climb the career…
Expanding tariffs may be capturing the headlines, but industrial-policy measures are on the rise as well. Governments have long implemented subsidies, incentives, and other interventions in domestic economies to support employment, critical manufacturing, and other national priorities. However, as the establishment of the World Trade Organization and the expansion of global trade made free-market and free-trade policies the global norm, many countries put less emphasis on supporting domestic industries. The…
Enterprise technology spending in the United States has been growing by 8 percent per year on average since 2022. This surge is not surprising, given the increasing role technology plays in how businesses function and create value. The issue lies in what companies are getting for that spend, and the track record on that score is mixed. While analysis linking tech spend to labor productivity is notoriously inexact, labor productivity…
The rapid adoption of glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonists is changing the life sciences landscape, with ripple effects extending well beyond cardiometabolic and obesity care. Global prescriptions of GLP-1 agonist therapies grew at a remarkable rate of roughly 38 percent annually between 2022 and 2024—sales are forecast to reach $100 billion by 2030. This growth has prompted interest in the downstream effects across healthcare and life sciences. In the medical aesthetics…
At a glance A global healthcare worker shortage of at least ten million is expected by 2030. Closing that shortage could avert 189 million years of life lost to early death and disability and boost the global economy by $1.1 trillion. While known supply-side interventions that enable the workforce to grow, thrive, and stay can add about 5.6 million healthcare workers, this is not enough to close the gap. Closing…
Amid overall uncertainty, including about the future that AI will bring, two things are clear. One, jobs and occupations will change as new technologies are used to handle and support more tasks. The transition to AI is already underway, according to the results of the latest McKinsey American Opportunity Survey (AOS) in which roughly 20 percent of employed respondents say that they have used gen AI for work purposes. Two,…
Since 2015, McKinsey, in partnership with LeanIn.Org, has conducted annual original research on women’s participation in the formal workforce in the United States and Canada through the Women in the Workplace report series. This report extends that pioneering research to new countries—India, Nigeria, and Kenya—for the first time, addressing a major data gap and deepening our understanding of women’s representation in the formal sector in these critical markets. Our analysis…
The rapid rise of gen AI has captured the world’s imagination and accelerated the integration of AI into the global economy and the lives of people across the world. Gen AI heralds a step change in productivity. As institutions apply AI in novel ways, beyond the advanced analytics and machine learning (ML) applications of the past ten years, the global economy could increase significantly, improving the lives and livelihoods of…
Modernization is one of the most pressing challenges facing the property and casualty (P&C) insurance industry. In the past decade, core systems built for a slower, paper-driven insurance model have evidently become no longer fit for purpose. They leave carriers struggling with operational inefficiencies, rising IT maintenance costs, and growing pressure to meet customer expectations for real-time responsiveness, such as instant quotes and faster claims payouts. Staying competitive demands adopting…
John Chambers, founder and CEO of JC2 Ventures and the former CEO and chairman of Cisco Systems for more than 20 years, grew Cisco to nearly $50 billion in annual revenues, helping companies around the world transform by leveraging the internet. On this episode of the At the Edge podcast, he joins host and McKinsey Senior Partner Lareina Yee to discuss the urgent need for companies to adopt AI and what this…
About 1.8 billion people in the world don’t get enough exercise. Physical inactivity is a global problem—but there are solutions. That’s one of the big themes in Sporting Goods 2025, a report published by McKinsey in partnership with the World Federation of the Sporting Goods Industry (WFSGI). This fifth edition of the annual report is titled, “The new balancing act: Turning uncertainty into opportunity.” In a recent webinar, four of…
Excellent governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) is a common aspiration, but how often is it a reality? For most companies, GRC is a work in progress, according to McKinsey’s 2025 Global GRC Benchmarking Survey (see sidebar, “Our survey methodology”). Despite efforts to broaden expertise at senior levels, corporate leaders see a “need for improvement” across numerous aspects of all three GRC pillars. There are many reasons for GRC shortfalls, some…