Pandemic greatly speeds up 72% of Singapore firms' digital transformation: poll

THE Covid-19 pandemic has been an accelerant of the adoption of digital tools, with 72 per cent of Singapore companies saying that it helped speed up their digital transformation "a great deal".

Going by the results of a global survey commissioned by cloud communications firm Twilio, the top barriers that were broken down included the lack of engineering support (46 per cent), reluctance to replace legacy software (45 per cent) and the lack of a clear strategy (42 per cent).

Companies are putting money where their mouth is. A total of 84 per cent of firms increased their budget for digital transformation in response to Covid-19. More than half of respondents said their company's budget has increased somewhat, while 28 per cent said that the budget has increased dramatically.

The proportion of companies with a dramatic increase in budget was slightly higher when compared with firms across the Asia-Pacific (25 per cent) and globally (26 per cent).

"Over the last few months, we've seen years-long digital transformation roadmaps compressed into days and weeks in order to adapt to the new normal as a result of Covid-19," said Glenn Weinstein, chief customer officer at Twilio.

"Cloud scale, speed and agility are enabling organisations to innovate faster than ever. We believe the solutions being built today will be the standard for digital engagement in the future."

Digital communications, defined as ways an organisation interacts digitally with stakeholders, saw a large boost. A total of 60 per cent of 272 Singapore companies said their digital communications strategy has been accelerated by five or more years.

Across all companies, digital communications strategy has been accelerated by an average of 7.2 years, higher than the global average of six years.

In the Asia-Pacific, the two sectors of retail and e-commerce, and finance saw their strategies speed up the most. The manufacturing and technology sectors lagged slightly behind.

More than half of respondents said that in response to the pandemic, their companies increased the volume of interactions within digital channels, increased their focus on omnichannel strategies, and added new digital channels.

As the world reopens, 54 per cent of companies are very likely to expand their digital communication channels, while 39 per cent are somewhat likely to do so.