Digital assimilation - it takes a lot more than marketing hype

WITH the commoditisation of compute, storage and network resources - namely in the form of new cloud and mobile infrastructures - the evolution of innovative and emerging technologies has done nothing but accelerate. We're seeing offerings from artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT) to analytics, virtual and augmented reality (VR & AR), 3D printing, blockchain and autonomous vehicles. And in return, we're witnessing the birth of smart cities and nations, connected healthcare, Industry 4.0 and other 'intelligent' markets. The barriers between human and machine interfaces are slowly dissolving as we all become citizens of a digital world.

But great digital strides come with new challenges - and for businesses looking to transform their processes, these technologies present very steep learning and implementation curves.

Indeed, it's clear that not everyone knows what they are doing. For example, recent industry research has revealed that more than two-thirds of all IoT projects do not make it into production. Though data is the currency of the century, separate studies also show that only 1 per cent of the millions upon millions of terra bytes of data being created around the world is actually used to make business decisions. The rest remains untouched, backed up and stored offline to age like fine wine.

So where is it that businesses are tripping up and why is it that so many of these projects fail?

Much of the issue lies in the way these projects are approached in the first place. Imagine, for example, Business A, who wants to incorporate a new technology - let's say IoT - into its digital transformation strategy. Business A creates a standalone proof-of-concept, which passes the test, and the IoT application is deployed. However, the technology is siloed, pumping out an island of data that neither feeds into any other IoT solution, or any of Business A's enterprise systems (such as ERP or CRM systems). Any potential added value and ROI for the business is lost because the solution isn't connected to anything else.

These technologies are exciting, but for them to reach their full disruptive potential, businesses need to move beyond the marketing hype and take a good hard look at their models and operational processes. How does the technology fit within the bigger picture? What adjacent technologies can it work with to deliver greater impact? How can it be incorporated into the organisation's structure and culture?

NEW THINKING

Phase 1 of any technology implementation journey should always start with the data question - if businesses start connecting the unconnected to networks and generating more data, what insights can you garner? If you aren't analysing the data, then why are you creating it? Just think of the business value that could be generated by going from the 1 per cent of data analysed today to simply 2 per cent or 3 per cent.

Of course, with more data, you need to bolster digital trust and security. In this environment, ownership and sovereignty will challenge the 'data is the new oil' paradigm. Service providers and enterprises will need to carefully consider how they will operate within global policy frameworks, share intelligence and combat growing cyberthreats as their points of vulnerability increase.

Phase 2 should look at the wider business ecosystem, analysing how the deployment will propel other functions and fit, or transform, the network it's going to be placed within.

This cannot be delivered without new thinking towards enterprise class infrastructure and innovations in the 'plumbing' side of things to power the digital environment. It also requires full business commitment to innovations - these deployments are not just 'IT' problems, but require collaboration from key decision-makers across a company.

Underpinning all of this is investment in talent. It is clear that most companies will need to think like they are a software company in order to stay competitive, so developers will become one of the critical assets in any digital transformation strategy. Of course, this talent is currently in high demand and short supply across markets around the world, so transformation efforts may well see businesses contributing to more training programmes and CSR initiatives to plug the gap in the pipeline.

The speed at which businesses are undergoing digitalisation is constantly accelerating, and the use of emerging technologies is continually challenging and disrupting practices around the world. The good news is that there are some natural fits for several of these technologies to be integrated within each other and within a digital workflow. The rewards for getting this right are enormous, delivering better business results and more personalised interactions with customers. But digital assimilation requires more than wishful thinking and must form part of a business' wider strategy - it cannot be the strategy in itself.