From Managing to Transforming: Exciting times in 2017

Sudhir Narang, Managing Director India, Global Services, BT

  • No Image

Being at the heart of digital transformation, telecom leaders and service providers are rapidly increasing their innovation bandwidth and going beyond the traditional task of connecting corners of the world to actually bringing the world together - faster, smarter and more efficient. India has been witnessing a steady economic growth that is expected to only grow further in times to come.

The telecom industry in India has been on a rising trajectory and is expected to witness a significant change with advancing and emerging technologies. Among the upcoming trends, digitization, security, cloud and big data technologies are maturing and clearly changing the way we work. Digitization will continue to expand and expose new opportunities and risks. The pressure to eradicate costs, standardise processes, reduce variables will reshape businesses to run more efficiently.

Data is moving at the speed of light with Internet of Things (IoT) making our devices and therefore us smarter every day. Augmented Reality is optimizing consumer engagement by harmonizing physical, virtual and digital experiences across platforms. An inevitable change has started to be seen as more and more organisations have started to fully embrace cloud services, recognising the cost-cutting and agility-improving benefits that they provide. With cloud becoming a universally accepted normal, an increase in the uptake of cloud services is expected to increase in the coming year.

Among the other trends, Data analysis is gaining traction as a crucial business function. Potential applications are increasingly including more strategizing and better personalisation. Big data and the ability to analyse it is becoming incredibly important as new data analysis tools can be applied to all sorts of data sets for insights. Security remains a systemic threat, but the security challenge is a wide one. Looking ahead, we’ll benefit from more intelligent networks that are literally ‘security aware’, and will independently detect and deal with vulnerabilities.

Factors like intelligent networking and network virtualisation will allow CIOs to connect more sensors, access more data and subsequently, carry out more analytics. The need for more dynamic networks that enable an agile response to events will also increase. It’s just not about flexibility; the network will be smarter too. For instance, the network will be security aware; it will detect that it is under attack and will be able to identify the threat and alert other networks.

The real value of business lies in its data. As we move forward, businesses will invest in technologies to develop new capabilities needed to refine big data. Extracting value from user-generated data poses a major challenge for businesses today. Hence, businesses will lean towards expanding their big data projects in order to capture real-time insights, meet customer expectations efficiently and accommodate future business growth. This will also act as an impetus for businesses to adopt the public cloud as a platform for data storage, which is steadily increasing.

Only by leveraging such opportunities, telecom firms will be able to tap into new customer groups, provide best-in-class services to their existing customer base and stay ahead. Maintaining a lean and efficient organisation that not only knows how to respond to its customers in real-time, but also facilitates seamless interaction within its workforce is the key to success. Thus, digital transformation and opting for a ‘digital first’ strategy can make all the difference between success and failure. With technological innovation, companies will be able to test new ideas at speeds and prices that were unimaginable even a decade ago.

🍪 Do you like cookies?

We use cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Read more...