26One of the hallmark behaviors of social groups is division of labour, where different group members 27 become specialized to carry out complementary tasks. By dividing labour, cooperative groups of 28 individuals increase their efficiency, thereby raising group fitness even if these specialized behaviors 29reduce the fitness of individual group members. Here we provide evidence that antibiotic production 30 in colonies of the multicellular bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor is coordinated by a division of labour. 31We show that S. coelicolor colonies are genetically heterogeneous due to massive amplifications and 32 deletions to the chromosome. Cells with gross chromosomal changes produce an increased diversity 33 of secondary metabolites and secrete significantly more antibiotics; however, these changes come at 34 the cost of dramatically reduced individual fitness, providing direct evidence for a trade-off between 35 secondary metabolite production and fitness. Finally, we show that colonies containing mixtures of 36 mutant strains and their parents produce significantly more antibiotics, while colony-wide spore 37 production remains unchanged. Our work demonstrates that by generating mutants that are 38 specialized to hyper-produce antibiotics, streptomycetes reduce the colony-wide fitness costs of 39 secreted secondary metabolites while maximizing the yield and diversity of these products. 40