The mining industry is at a crossroads. Costs are rising, ore grades are falling, and demand for critical materials is accelerating—pressuring operating models built for a different era. At the same time, a powerful wave of new technologies is reaching maturity across sectors. Advances in automation, AI, electrification, chemistry, and site connectivity—many of which are proven in adjacent industries—are reshaping how mines operate. Select industry leaders and some regions are scaling these technologies, demonstrating what the next era of performance in mining could look like.
This article illustrates how mining leaders can seize the moment by setting bold technological aspirations, focusing on the right problems, and accelerating the shift from pilots to real-world impact.
The productivity challenge: When ‘more of the same’ stops working
Every productivity leap in the past 125 years of mining has been powered by innovation, including mechanization in the 19th century, open-pit mining and large-scale equipment in the 20th century, and process automation at the turn of the millennium (Exhibit 1).
Decades of research show that innovation is one of the strongest long-term drivers of productivity and profitability across industries.1 Despite the need for—and clear benefits of—innovation in mining, momentum has slowed over the past two decades. In fact, OECD data2 show that productivity in manufacturing industries more than doubled from 1997 to 2023, while agriculture, forestry, and fishing increased by more than 1.5 times (Exhibit 2). Meanwhile, mining saw its productivity decrease by half, a trend further confirmed by McKinsey analysis.
Declining ore grades, increasing operating complexity, and escalating input costs—such as in energy and maintenance—have compounded operating strains, pushing many mines below historic performance curves (Exhibit 3).
Meanwhile, demand for critical minerals is surging, fueled by electrification, the energy transition, AI, and the rise of connected devices. By 2035, demand is expected to nearly double for rare earth elements, rise by about 25 percent for copper and aluminum, and more than quadruple for lithium.3 As demand grows and mining productivity becomes paramount, innovation is essential—not optional.
New technological tailwinds: An opportunity for change
Although improved productivity can be attributed to a range of activities, including optimization, evidence suggests a link between sustained productivity gains and the scaling of digital, automation, and data technologies. On this point, such innovations position the industry to benefit from the following tailwinds:
- The use of autonomous vehicles is maturing and scaling. With autonomy advancing in other industries, there is a significant opportunity to scale autonomous trucks in mining.
- Always-on connectivity is reaching remote sites around the world. Mines of all kinds are increasingly adopting real-time monitoring, control, and centralized operations, enabled by low-orbit satellite connectivity.
- The promise of AI is accelerating exponentially. Leading miners are already seeing gains from applying deep learning to optimize fixed plants and dispatch to using cutting-edge agentic AI4 to reinvent complex processes such as source-to-pay and issue identification.
- Electrification is in active deployment. In China, fleets of smaller electric-haul trucks (typically ranging from 90 to 150 metric tons) are already operating commercially, while miners around the globe are launching pilot programs for battery electric and trolley-assisted fleets.
- Advances in chemistry and bioengineering are challenging what’s possible in mineral recovery. Leaders are discovering new reagents and deploying techniques to improve the recovery of materials previously thought unrecoverable or uneconomic (see sidebar “Chalcopyrite leaching”).
- Data and low-cost sensing are redefining visibility in mining. From real-time downhole sensing to granular characterization of extracted rock, new generations of high-resolution sensors and modern data architectures can enable near-real-time optimization of ore routing, processing, and equipment performance.
- Robotics is expanding the frontier of automation. Although still early, advances in robotic systems could dramatically improve safety, utilization, and consistency by enabling machines to perform complex physical work with minimal human intervention.
With so much opportunity on the horizon, many miners are understandably struggling with where to start. Our experience shows it’s helpful to prioritize steps in the value chain for disruption (Exhibit 4).
The question now is how leading mining companies, and the mining industry at large, will take advantage of today’s tailwinds, harness these innovations, and capture opportunities to change their productivity.
Signals of disruption in action
Pockets of the mining industry are already demonstrating transformation from at-scale innovation, with years of pilot activity transforming into full-scale operations.
Our analysis shows examples of fast-moving innovation in China’s mining industry (see sidebar “Technological progress in China”). In fact, Chinese companies account for nearly 56 percent of autonomous and tele-remote equipment.5 Autonomy, electrification, and digital orchestration are advancing in parallel, supported by collaboration among equipment OEMs, technology providers, and policy enablers. Many of the at-scale breakthroughs now on display were achieved in less than five years, demonstrating how aligned ecosystems among miners, OEMs, and digital players can compress innovation timelines.
Companies in Australia have shown progress in remote operations. The distance from deposits to population centers, the cost of attracting and transporting workers to those deposits, and the value at stake in continuous optimization have pushed Australian mining leaders not only to run and monitor equipment remotely but also to optimize fleets.
Finally, copper producers in North and South America, facing declining grades, increasing costs, and a strong desire to deliver the highest possible ROI from billion-dollar fixed-plant installations, have pioneered deep learning and digital twins to increase throughput and recovery in concentrators.
From aspiration to execution: How leading mining companies are creating results from innovation
The next decade will likely reward those who make clear, bold, and intentional strategic decisions about what roles they play in the innovation landscape and what problems they explicitly focus on solving. We believe successful innovators typically structure their processes around iterative, continuous feedback loops with three interconnected and reinforcing stages: aspiration, innovation, and execution (Exhibit 5).
Aspiration: Creating tech-driven aspirations at the core
Many of the challenges miners face today are structural. Big innovations don’t come from small aspirations. Think of landing a man on the moon; someone needed to set the audacious goal to inspire people to seek solutions to make it possible. Similarly, SpaceX identified the value in being able to reuse launch craft, focusing engineers on the specific problem to solve.
Mining leaders have an opportunity to focus on the right problems for innovation teams to solve and subsequently set transformational aspirations to yield transformational outcomes. Chalcopyrite leaching is one example of a potential problem to solve because it addresses a specific and valuable issue. Other miners typically focus on current and future stressors, rising costs, workforce scarcity, or throughput bottlenecks.
Innovation: Managing solutions as if they were a portfolio
Once a specific, compelling, and aspirational goal is clearly defined, it’s time to turn to innovation.
Innovation leaders can start by breaking a problem down to its first principles and defining the fundamental physics, processes, and constraints of the system rather than jumping to ready-made tools. Rather than thinking about creating value from automation, mining leaders can question the most cost-effective way to move rocks from point A to point B. More fundamentally, they can ask themselves, “Do I even need to move a rock from point A to point B?”
Running inspiration sessions that bring together operators, engineers, and experts to challenge assumptions, bring inspirational examples from other industries, and surface unconventional options is often a key source of ideas and is effective at engaging and energizing the team. Coming out of these sessions, companies might have a suite of ideas that can be further defined and developed to shape the core of the portfolio. Many miners find it helpful to talk about the relative maturity of each idea using standard definitions such as technology readiness levels (TRLs), which range from TRL 1 (an early-stage concept) to TRL 9 (a proven and commercially available solution).
A step that often separates the best innovators from the pack is building a cost ramp-down curve. This typically refers to how quickly a solution can become cheaper to produce or implement as well as how quickly a solution can reach its full potential. For example, the cost to manufacture solar panels has drastically declined in the past few decades, and it stands to reason that battery technology will follow suit. Building a cost ramp-down curve requires innovators to take the cost and performance of any potential solution and break it down to understand what each component cost could be in the future.
Many industries have already demonstrated how rapidly costs can fall as technologies scale (Exhibit 6).6 Reaching the bottom of a cost ramp-down requires leaders willing to set bold aspirations, commit early, and push relentlessly toward scale. Mining will be no different. Visionaries who embrace this challenge today will likely be best positioned to shape the next era of productivity.
Execution: Translating ideas to the real world
Once companies build a portfolio of potential solutions to a given problem, success depends on their ability to translate ideas into disciplined experimentation, fast learning, and comprehensive scaling. Pilot progress can be measured by the speed and quality of learning rather than immediate results, which then allows innovation leaders to refine the portfolio, adjust the risk impact, and identify where human and capital resources are deployed during the next learning cycle.
Innovation also requires dedicated teams with both the mandate and the space to deliver. These teams can be staffed with top operational and technical talent and given explicit ownership of specific innovation themes. Separate reporting channels are critical. Without a separate mandate, teams can be caught between the need to deliver today’s budget or operational plan and the need to solve the innovation challenges that will set the organization up for success in the future.
A well-designed innovation operating model can help provide the governance backbone that keeps these teams aligned and effective. Such models emphasize live, on-the-ground decision-making, in which questions are resolved quickly and iteration replaces long review cycles. Teams are guided by deep technical leaders who balance rigorous analysis with pragmatic “80/20”7 problem-solving. Governance can be tight but not bureaucratic, with initiatives that aim for clear decision rights, access to expert support, and visibility for senior sponsors who can help resolve challenges in real time.
Finally, successful execution often requires redefining relationships with suppliers and partners. Companies can consider collaborative partnerships built on shared experimentation, codevelopment, and joint accountability for outcomes, potentially accelerating cost and performance improvements while creating mutual ownership of success. If that is not available in the supplier ecosystem, true innovation leaders can consider the option to self-perform or vertically integrate.
Given the challenges facing today’s miners, it’s clear that the next era of performance will be led by the innovators. The combination of AI, autonomous tech, advanced chemistry, robotics, and connected systems offers not just incremental efficiency but the opportunity for significant changes in productivity. The opportunity is real, but so is the competition. Players that succeed will likely act with courage and clarity, making moves today to focus on the right problems, set ambitious aspirations, pursue disciplined innovation, and execute with speed and conviction. The recipe for success is clear. Which industry leaders will follow it?
