Many companies are well on their way to transforming themselves into digital businesses. In using the power of digital technology to reshape their businesses, however, these companies have made a startling discovery: They are part of a much larger digital ecosystem. According to Accenture Technology Vision 2015, Accenture’s annual outlook of enterprise technology trends, these companies are seeing old boundaries blur as platforms create interconnected ecosystems out of previously disparate companies and industries.
Pioneering companies are tapping into an wide array of other digital businesses, digital customers and even digital devices to operate in new digital ecosystems. They are finding themselves part of a digital fabric that touches all aspects of their business, their customer relationships, and the environment in which they operate. Such companies routinely deal with hundreds of business processes, thousands of employees, and millions of consumers.
Leading companies are using these digital ecosystems to offer new services, improve customer experiences and enter new markets. Home Depot, for example, is working with manufacturers to make sure that all of the connected home products it sells are compatible with the Wink connected home system. In doing so, Home Depot is creating its own connected home ecosystem, with a wide range of services that are easy to install.
Philips is taking a similar approach, teaming with Salesforce to build a platform to optimize the way healthcare is delivered. This platform is designed to create an ecosystem of developers building healthcare applications to enable collaboration and workflow between doctors and patients across the entire spectrum of care. This is a vast ecosystem including electronic medical records as well as diagnostic and treatment equipment obtained through Philips’ imaging equipment, monitoring equipment, and personal devices and technologies.
The rise of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is fueling the acceleration of digital businesses, which are further enabled by digital accelerators including social, mobile, analytics and cloud. In the Accenture Technology Vision 2015 we identify five key trends will continue to drive the tremendous pace of change in enterprise IT.
1. The Internet of Me: Our world, personalized. Everyday objects are going online, and so are experiences. Digital channels now reach deeply into every aspect of individuals’ lives, and forward-thinking businesses are changing the ways they build new applications, products and services. They are creating highly personalized experiences that engage customers while protecting the customers’ trust. We expect the companies that succeed in this "Internet of Me" to become the next generation of household names.
2. Outcome Economy: Hardware producing hard results. Intelligent hardware is bridging the last mile between the digital enterprise and the physical world. Leading enterprises confronting the IoT are uncovering opportunities to use highly connected hardware components to give customers what they really want: not just more products and services, but more meaningful outcomes. These "digital disrupters" get ahead by selling results, not things.
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3. The Platform (R)evolution: Defining ecosystems, refining industries. Digital industry platforms and ecosystems are fueling the next wave of breakthrough innovation and disruptive growth. Platform-based companies are capturing more of the digital economy’s opportunities for strong growth and profitability. Rapid advances in cloud and mobility are opening up this new playing filed to enterprises across industries and geographies. In fact, 75 percent of survey respondents said that the next generation of platforms will not be led by large tech companies, but by industry players and leaders.
4. Intelligent Enterprise: Huge data + smarter systems = better business. The next level of operational excellence and the next generation of software services will both emerge from the latest gains in software intelligence. Until now, increasingly capable software has been geared to help employers make better and faster decisions. But with the influx of big data – along with advances in processing power, data science, and cognitive technology – software intelligence is now helping machines make better and faster decisions. This will drive new levels of evolution and discovery, propelling innovation throughout the enterprise.
5. Workforce Reimagined: Collaboration at the intersection of humans and machines. The push to go digital amplifies the need for humans and machines to do more, together. Advances in natural interfaces, wearable devices, and smart machines will present new opportunities for companies to empower their workers through technology. There will also be new challenges in managing a collaborative workforce composed of both people and machines. Successful businesses will embrace both as critical members of the reimagined workforce.
Running a digital business is not as simple as plugging digital technologies into an organization. It’s about using digital technology to propel businesses into the broader digital ecosystem that includes customers, partners, employers and industries. Leading companies are looking for ways to combine their industry expertise with the power of digital technology to reshape their markets and drive new growth in the "We Economy."
