Tech is the chief differentiator in this crisis

On May 11, 1998, India went nuclear again with Pokhran II. That is why that day is celebrated as National Technology Day. After more than 20 years, this day is more and more relevant as, as we turn to technology to tide us out of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown crisis. A look at some industry views on technology on this day…

Biggest catalyst for Digital Transformation

“COVID-19 became the biggest catalyst for Digital Transformation. With the requirement to access critical applications and scalability of the infrastructure, cloud computing has emerged as a vital technology. Companies have now realized that it is extremely important for them to realign their IT infrastructure for parallel execution. While organizations tighten their IT budgets, they will move to increase their cloud adoption, re-strategize data management and cybersecurity plans. Moreover, remote monitoring and automation, network optimization, mobile applications, and stress test to handle increased capacity are going to be key considerations. We will also see public sector embracing adoption of cloud computing and banks fortifying contactless payments, thereby boosting Hon’ble PMO India’s Digital India initiative. On this National Technology Day, we would want to thank and recognize the efforts of our IT personnel, who have worked relentlessly, ensured seamless work from home and immensely contributed at every stages of work—wherever and whenever required.”
—Saurabh Saxena, Country Director – India, Micro Focus

Zero tolerance for failed automation projects

“COVID-19 has disrupted businesses across nearly every industry and fast recovery will require companies to become increasingly resilient, flexible, and adaptable. The number one priority that all enterprises and industries must address today is how to leverage technology as the key to operational resilience, in order to build a stronger, more robust and more resilient business going forward post-COVID-19. To move the needle on this, enterprises are looking to build more automation into their business-critical processes and are asking for help with identifying the right solutions to accelerate successful enablement. We’re increasingly seeing those who were on the fence with automation, or who had previously only automated tasks—versus end-to-end processes—looking to scale up to meet end customer commitments. Another huge challenge faced is the sheer volume of business data, mainly comprised of unstructured data that needs to be processed and analysed. The ability to solve for unstructured data is a huge enabler for operational resilience. This new period we are entering has further highlighted the failings of traditional technologies such as OCR, and the time has now come for enterprises to look to solve for their unstructured data challenges. And as there is zero tolerance in this current climate for failed automation projects and misaligned expectations, it is now even more imperative to get the “data piece” of the automation puzzle correct at the outset. AntWorks Cognitive Machine Reading (CMR) has the unique capability to ingest and read high volumes of unstructured and complex business data in a fraction of the time with incredibly high accuracy rates for all data types. Adopting a CMR approach to automation gives enterprises a distinct competitive edge by capturing and curating all data to help achieve straight-through processing and accelerate business outcomes.”
—Asheesh Mehra, Co-Founder and Group CEO, AntWorks

Technology is the differentiator

“When pandemics like the recent COVID-19 strike, human life, global economy and the business world are all under serious threat. It is not a new phenomenon. The difference today is with the new technologies, such as Cloud Security, AI, IoT, Big data, and others, the process of finding a cure is faster, much to the delight of scientists. While this will take a while to materialize, more importantly we have to acknowledge, technology is also ensuring continuity of businesses. Virtual meetings, cloud conferencing, remote access to data among others, ensure work is not impacted while social distancing is being maintained. The new work culture is also in a way preparing for the next outbreak and leveraging technology for better functioning will certainly become the ‘new normal’. Work-from- home option will increasingly be considered more than before in the coming years. With technologies such as Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), work collaboration tools, cloud technology and others, remote working will ensure work will not be impacted across many industries. This will also provide the much needed flexibility while saving commuting time. Some associated challenges with isolation will be addressed too in the long run. Cloud adoption is becoming more crucial too with an increase in remote working. Cloud management provides easy access of data for employees to work and share at the same time data is protected too. According to Gartner, by 2022, upto 60% of the organizations will leverage cloud-managed service offering by an external service provider. Related services such as online delivery and digital payments are increasingly leveraged leading to the retail sector to establish a robust logistics system. Yes, supply chain 4.0, will leverage its core technologies such as Big Data, Cloud Computing and Blockchain to enable better customer service with timely delivery of both essentials and non-essentials to the end customer.”
—Amit Gupta, Co-founder & CEO at Rapyder Cloud Solutions.

Telemedicine will improve quality & access to healthcare

“Digital technologies are transforming many industries, and healthcare is one of them. However, in healthcare, the digital technologies must meet the needs of patients and providers alike especially giving individuals an ability to take control of their own health and wellness. Just as the coronavirus pandemic has made work from home a widely adopted practice, we believe that care from home will become a reality with the advances in remote monitoring and connected MedTech facilitating seamless communication among health systems. Solutions such as telemedicine will be able to significantly improve the quality and access to healthcare and making it available in areas, which are facing a lack of infrastructure and healthcare professionals such as some remote villages in India. Also, data intensive technologies like AI will be able to further improve healthcare outcomes by increasing the accuracy and speed of diagnosis and enabling better clinical decision making.”
—Gerd Hoefner, MD and President, Siemens Healthcare Pvt. Ltd.

A tribute to women in tech on this day

“Despite the fact that almost half of India’s population is comprised of women, gender inequality continues to exist in the workplace. To encourage more women to pursue careers in technology, we have to start by emphasizing a STEM curriculum for girls early on. Women also face professional hurdles during the transition from managing to leading, typically during the promotion to director-level positions. At this stage, the potential for conscious and unconscious bias is high, as the people in decision making roles for leadership promotions tend to be men. Companies can address this by ensuring that interview panels and promotion decision makers include both men and women and that there is a diverse group of candidates being evaluated for each position. I’ve had an incredibly rewarding career in technology and would encourage other women to pursue their passion in this field. At Blackhawk Network, we’re proud that nearly 50% of our leadership positions are held by women, most notably, Talbott Roche, our CEO and President. We’re committed to supporting the recruitment, retention and advancement of women in technology.”
—Leila Pourhashemi, VP—Technology Business Operations, Blackhawk Network.