Page 9 - Issue 4 2023

SOFTWARE, DATA AND SERVICES

From infancy to adolescence:

A look at the progression of

digital Transformation

It’s been just over ten years since digital transformation became an integral part of the business
environment, writes Rebatho Madiba, Business Development Digital Platform Solutions at BCX,
but as it grows older, is it meeting expectations?

n 2015, the World Economic Foundation identified six megatrends that were set to
change the face of business and society and every single one was aligned with the
Iconcept of digital transformation. From how the internet would become a social and
physical extension of people’s lives and experiences through to compute and storage
everywhere to the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI) and the digitisation
of matter, these trends are now an inherent part of society today.
Some of these trends have already reached significant milestones, others are
expected to achieve their tipping points – a critical point that results in unstoppable
change – over the next few years. One such milestone is the mega-trend of people
and the internet, where their interaction with the web becomes a ‘mental, social, and
physical extension of themselves’, is expected to reach 80% of people with a digital
presence on the internet by 2023, with the tipping point in 2025. Today, 59% of the
world’s population uses social media and enhance their digital presence through online
platforms and connections, and this is only set to become more immersive as trends
like the metaverse continue to gain traction. Rebatho Madiba
Driven by the pandemic and the need for people to find innovative ways of
working and connecting online, digital has become as much a part of daily life as cars
and shopping. It has reshaped how people communicate and collaborate and it has collaborate with service providers
supercharged productivity and performance. In the 1980s, communication was in which offer a wide spectrum of cloud
person or by post. Today it’s faster than a thought. Organisations can’t afford to be and computing solutions that can
left behind, which makes 2023 an opportunity to focus on platforms and technologies directly address their challenges
that empower people from anywhere and that ensure their online presence is always and help them overcome obstacles
on. This is where solutions that provide access, data networks, wireless and unified impacting on their scale and
collaboration capabilities are key as they enable industry and fulfil online requirements productivity. This is particularly true
through omnichannel applications. of the challenge of data sovereignty
Another megatrend, one that’s now so commonplace in boardroom discussions that has inhibited many companies,
that it’s hard to imagine a business without it, is that of compute, communications and especially in Africa.
storage everywhere. The tipping point for this technology is anticipated to be in 2025 IoT has, of course, been a part of
with, as cited by Statista, just over five billion people on the internet as of April 2022. the IT landscape for a long time but
This highly connected population has seen the radical and accelerated transformation has only recently started to deliver
of online experiences which has, in turn, driven the need for scalable and elastic on the promises it made when it
computing power that can be accessible from anywhere, and which can deliver on first entered the business landscape.
demand. Today, the number of IoT connected
Moving forward, applications and services will only get hungrier for data and devices worldwide is expected to
capability. Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0 technologies and innovations will have to be reach 29 billion by 2030, says Statista,
rendered from highly reliable and flexible platforms, and quantum compute is very and is at 13 billion as of 2022 and,
likely to bring physics into computer science to create devices and environments that according to the IoT Industry Council
are minute – that optimise space and capacity. Moving forward, companies need to of South Africa, IoT is expected to

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