Sailing ahead with digital transformation in rough seas

THE outlook for 2023 looks stormy with looming layoffs, scarce talent, soaring inflation and fears of a recession. Amid the volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous environment, companies are quickly becoming digitally dependent. Within the next year, Gartner forecasts that worldwide IT spending will grow 5.1 per cent to US$4.6 trillion.

There are some inescapable truths about digital. First, everything that is default offline will become default online. The future is digital, with connective technologies like 5G and Wi-Fi 6 speeding up networks significantly. Second, every industry will be reimagined and redefined by technology. Digital transformation, led by retail, banking and governments, will continue to revolutionise sectors such as the arts, agriculture and construction. Third, the speed of change influenced, impacted and enabled by technology will continue to accelerate.

Technology continues to be a double-edged sword. While it disrupts and creates new opportunities, it may also produce redundancy through non-competitiveness. Netflix, Grab and Amazon are easy case studies to illustrate how industry and competitive battle lines have been redrawn with the clever adoption of new technologies. As such, innovation and creativity are at the front line and who dares wins.