In recent years, a wave of technological innovations with potentially disruptive effects across industries has been emerging. Known by many names, such as “advanced manufacturing”, “Industry 4.0”, “Fourth Industrial Revolution”, or “digital transformation”, this trend groups different technology clusters such as the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), Artificial Intelligence, and Data Analytics, 3D printing, and Advanced Robotics. In this dissertation, they are referred to as Advanced Digital Production Technologies (ADPTs). Due to their increasing prominence among industrialists, policymakers, and academics around the world, a question emerges as to whether ADPTs could open pathways for economic development in developing countries.

This dissertation seeks to address this issue, and answer the following research question: Are ADPTs an opportunity for economic development in developing countries, and, if so, what should these countries do to seize it? The general research path taken to answer this question involved a theoretical and conceptual review of the topic, a “global mapping” of countries’ engagement with ADPTs, and a deep dive into the case of Brazil. The “global mapping” was carried out through a historical review and an analysis combining international trade data and the findings of previous works using patent data. The investigation of Brazil analysed the country’s ADPT policy system and the engagement of the country’s Machinery and Equipment industry with these technologies. This led to the writing of six chapters.

The overall conclusion of the dissertation is that ADPTs do not offer as many opportunities for developing countries as it is often claimed. Leapfrogging opportunities exist but depend on how developed the ICT and industrial machinery industries are in each country, and on what type of engagement the country has with these technologies. Seizing these opportunities also requires implementing appropriate industrial policies that help overcome the many obstacles to using, producing, and developing ADPTs, as well as an enabling macroeconomic environment. Brazil is identified as a country that is well-positioned to take advantage of these technologies but that so far has had insufficient policies to do so.