Digital

In the digital world, the emergence of a novel application sparks enthusiasm and perhaps a certain amount of controversy. One such game-changing application which has taken the world by storm is ChatGPT, a large language model (LLM) developed by OpenAI and based on the GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) architecture. As a machine learning model, ChatGPT can assist with a wide range of tasks involving Natural Language Processing (NLP). It is unique as it is trained on a very large dataset of internet text or the WebText data set to produce contextually relevant tones and responses that resemble human communication. Sonata being a game-changing tech modernization provider, strongly believe that there is no dearth of opportunities for businesses to integrate ChatGPT into their routine workflows and applications. Through this paper, we would like to share our views and offerings to help businesses grow their bottom line, enhance customer experience, improve efficiency, and strengthen governance.

Leveraging GPT technology from Open AI (ChatGPT) to drive Agility in Customer Experience, Compliance, and Engineering 

Modernize for Growth via best-in-class Customer Experience 

With deepened complexity resulting from globalization and fierce competition, organizations are increasingly relying on technology to effectively communicate and connect with their customers. As per Fortune Business Insights, the global customer experience management market is projected to grow from $11.34 billion in 2022 to $ 32.53 billion in 2029 at a CAGR of 16.2%. With advanced natural language processing capabilities, ChatGPT can share a deeper insight into customer persona and can be used to ensure a seamless and positive customer experience journey from product/service discovery to after-sale support and repeat business. 

Modernize Compliance processes 

Businesses aim to comply with legal and regulatory standards to steer clear of unfavorable outcomes including financial penalties, lawsuits, and reputational damage. As per our research and findings, ChatGPT can play a pivotal role in the automation of regulatory compliance adherence through legal document summarization, matching regulations with internal policies or procedures, audit assistance, report generation, and GPT chatbot to address audit-related queries. 

Modernize Engineering processes

Due to complexity, engineers encounter time-consuming and escalating cost challenges in researching technical issues. Sonata’s research shows that ChatGPT can accelerate Digital Engineering speed and quality by 30%. It can break down bigger coding tasks into small components, conduct quality checks on existing code for bugs and errors, and drive self-service and reliability in the app and infra support. Reimagine processes – Sonata’s capability to offer differentiated ChatGPT experience Sonata Software’s modernization positioning is focused on driving intelligence through AI-assisted solutions and innovations in the client ecosystem. The team of architects and developers has explored the GPT tool on both Open AI and Azure. Azure is expected to offer enhanced security despite the complexities involved and relatively higher costs.

Our Lightning Platform is equipped to prototype any ChatGPT-driven use case across industries, Fast Track Applications, and AI-driven solutions in existing and new processes and apps by integrating with Open AI/Azure Open AI APIs. The platform aims to provide a holistic approach to the responsible implementation of GPT use cases efficiently and effectively. The tool enables the use of the right APIs from OpenAI and the pre and post-processing required on the input and output. The Lightning Code Assist is another unique offering to provide developers recommendations and generative assistance in the context of Tools and guidelines. 

Sonata’s goal is to provide exceptional value to our marquee clients across all sectors and business verticals in BFSI, Retail, Healthcare, and Life Sciences for HR, Marketing, Engineering, and  Technology. The features range from knowledge management, technical troubleshooting, Sentiment Analysis, Resume Short-lister, training content, workflow automation, and website content search. In addition, our developers are evaluating the incorporation of ChatGPT in healthcare through the Health and Life Sciences Scribe bot to create Electronic Health Record (EHR) documents from any audio conversation with patients. 

Always Ahead of the Curve: Sonata’s Commitment to offering cutting edge Conversational AI Technology

  Implementation of any new technology necessitates capability build and hence we at Sonata recommend a Centre of Excellence (COE) model which would involve pre-processing, processing, and post-processing stages. Most importantly, it is essential to establish a system of governance to address potential privacy risks and adhere to industry regulations as well as monitor usage and associated benefits. The risks associated with ChatGPT and other AI technologies have been the subject of much media attention in the recent past. Despite taking measures to prevent the model from responding to inappropriate requests, it may produce biased and harmful responses. In addition to the generic limitations, the team at Sonata has observed that the time required for the training process is slightly higher as the models have to be accurate and effective. Human intervention may be required at times to ensure that high-quality and relevant prompts are used. 

Sonata has built the capability to iron out specific wrinkles, extract the true potential of ChatGPT to augment professional competencies, and make it more secure. Depending on the scenario, Sonata Software may employ different approaches to training its models to achieve optimal results.  With the new buzz around ChatGPT 4 which as per Open AI is more creative and collaborative than its predecessor, GPT 3.5, our Research and Development team is currently evaluating its capabilities. We are examining the functionalities it offers for generating, editing, and iterating with users on creative and technical writing tasks. 

The team of experienced and trained professionals is constantly evaluating further enhancements and developments. Sonata strongly believes in continuous improvement and development with each evolved version thereby enabling businesses to strengthen governance, deliver long-term value, and stay ahead of the competition.

Digital transformation was already an important strategic objective before the COVID-19 epidemic. However, the pandemic has acted as a catalyst to accelerate the transformation journey for the majority of the companies.

What was once considered the best-in-class speed of operations for a majority of business cases is now seen as uncompetitively slow. Changes in customer expectations surrounding products and services have accelerated digital transformation.

Digital transformation is an umbrella term - covering the application of new technologies, skills, and procedures to create efficient business operations that satisfy customers. It is about reimagining how a company leverages technology, people, and processes, either through changing existing business processes or creating new business models and income streams.

For many traditional goods-producing companies, this means developing digital products such as mobile apps or e-commerce platforms. Companies have been on digital transformation journeys for several years to combat the threat of disruption from incumbents and startups, but progress after the pandemic has been incredibly fast.

For faster and safer delivery, retailers like Walmart and Bed Bath & Beyond shook up store operations by switching to curbside delivery and other contactless options. Meanwhile, IT professionals re-prioritized their strategic IT roadmaps, with many embracing cloud software for video collaboration and installing machine learning (ML) software to help companies monitor how items move through supply chains.

Such solutions do not facilitate transformation on a point-by-point basis. Rather, the way these tools and other solutions are woven into a company's digital health — and reflect its business priorities — provides a clearer picture of its digital fitness.

There are a few ways to accelerate your digital transformation journey and stay ahead of the competition:

• Reimagining your services.
• Creating distinctive customer experiences.
• Redefine new business and revenue models.
• Rectify and resolve issues as soon as possible.

For the past decade, Sonata Software has been assisting enterprises in accelerating their digital transformation journey through our proprietary Platformation^TM methodology.

Platformation^TM is a methodology for creating powerful digital platforms that are connected, open, scalable, and intelligent. Sonata leverages this methodology to help companies develop a sharp digital transformation strategy and build platforms that drive their business growth in this phygital world. Sonata Software helps in unlocking value and growth through platforms and shapes the digital agenda with the help of platform-led thinking.

Sonata Software's Platformation^TM approach guides an organization through the entire platform adoption process, from defining its vision to selecting an appropriate strategy and implementing its platform adoption roadmap.

Platformation^TM consisted of five steps:

Strategy and Operations
The first step's major goal is to design an acceptable strategy based on the company's context, needs, and business goals. Businesses could also choose an appropriate platform type that could serve as a model for their envisioned platform. An organization may grasp the expected value as well as the dangers of embarking on the platformation journey by outlining the platform plan in advance.

Maturity Assessment
Understanding and capturing the organization's existing position in terms of business and technology readiness to commence Platformation™ is a fundamental goal of the second step in the process. Corporate and technology readiness assessments assist business leaders in better understanding the existing situation and developing pragmatic strategies based on the time and resources required to transform technology areas and business areas.

Business Architecture
In order to fulfill the platform's goal of developing a connected, intelligent, open, and scalable platform, company leaders can use the platform's business architecture to reorganize or even restructure business operations and key interactions among platform members.

Technology Architecture
Business executives can establish an execution roadmap and plan for the Platformation™ journey by defining priorities across available technology techniques and potential future designs.

Realization
Business executives can align with the organization's platformation strategy and goals by establishing the platform realization approach and laying out the development and execution roadmap by defining key releases, teams, and launch strategies.

FAQs

What is digital transformation?
Digital transformation is the process of reimagining and reinventing business operations, roles, and technology-driven by crafting unique user journeys to cater to the expectations of customers. This is done by linking all business processes to a connected ecosystem where customer experience is the core.

What are the benefits of digital transformation?
There are various benefits of digital transformation. Some of them are listed below:

• Improved data collection
• Effective resource management
• Advanced insights
• Unique customer experiences
• Improved collaboration
• A better revenue model
• Brings agility
• Enhance productivity

What is the impact of digital transformation on your business?
A good digital marketing strategy can impact your business in many ways.

• Increased revenue
• Low operating cost
• Better customer satisfaction
• Customer loyalty
• Lowered fragmentation

Sonata Software specializes in building platforms and frameworks to accelerate your digital transformation journey. Watch out for this space for more updates. Worried about your digital transformation journey? Reach out to us today and, we will show you the way forward.
 

In a fast-paced global market, Railways have been leveraging technology to ensure safety goals & to reduce environmental impact..
Looking to the future ,rail technology will strive to expand on their previous triumphs. While rail technology will continue to be widely used as Railways  look to harness the massive volumes of data collected using innovative algorithms and data analysis software to increase safety . Next-generation automation technologies will continue to improve safety and effectiveness by reducing the influence of human error and limits on railway operations. Importantly, however, rail technology is expanding to ensure the sector enters a new age of innovation that increases trustworthiness & customer service, targeting an ever increasing number of customer touchpoints
Key technological trends that will become a part of rail technology &  help shape the future of rail travel :

The Internet of Things (IoT)

A network of interconnected mechanical and digital machines, things, creatures, or people having unique identifiers (UIDs) and the ability to transfer data over a network without the need for human or computer contact.
The Internet of Things (IoT) alters how people live, work, and travel, earning it the moniker "the new Industrial Revolution."
It will assist railways in enhancing passenger safety and experience while also increasing operational efficiency. IoT has begun to progress the railways in a variety of ways, including higher efficiency and improved customer experience. The key outcomes being:

• Significant dependability and security.
• Reduced maintenance delays
• Advanced analytics for efficient operations
• Improvement & revamping of  customer experience .

Big Data and Big Solutions

Big data assists railways in a variety of ways,  addressing and resolving major difficulties. Railways have accumulated databases with hundreds & trillion bits of information about the status of track and equipment thanks to smart sensors distributed across the network and innovative track inspection technologies. Railways can find crucial data trends and apply what they've learned to improve safety and operations using the data they've collected.

Cloud-based technology

Instead of having local servers, cloud computing relies on the sharing of computing resources. While a relatively new technology that arose from years of study into visualization, it has gained enormous traction given features like distributed and utility computing, and, more recently, networking, online, and software services. This study laid the groundwork for the term "cloud" to be used in cloud computing. It features a service-oriented design, reduced end-user information technology outflow, flexibility, lower ownership costs, on-demand services, and more.

Railways use cloud computing to capture railway information resources and enhance the capacity of information processing. The key benefits of deploying cloud-based technology are:

• Cost-saving, this being a hosted service,
• Enhanced security,
• Significant accessibility.

The Era of Living Services

The Era of Living Services is again, a relatively new term that describes how brands use the internet of things and powerful data analytics to create services that come to life, forecasting and reacting to customers’ changing needs and situations in real time. It seems to have the effect of living services on most aspects of our lives—from our homes, finances, and work, to our health, shopping, and the future of travel.

Embracing Automation

Automation holds great significance for the future of the railway’s safety and efficiency.  Implementation of next-generation automation technology will ensure railways will be able to conduct safety inspections more frequently, detect more flaws more reliably and provide solutions more quickly.

While reducing human-caused accidents, automation also has the effect of improving and upgrading network effectiveness and safety, allowing more commodities to be transported by rail, lowering the demand for highway capacity and improving fuel efficiency and air pollution.

Rail technology used to improve profitability:

To encourage ancillary revenue, railways can promote real-time offers and sell customized, relevant ancillary items to the correct customers at the correct time during different phases of the journey, from Insurance, to food of choice, to pick up & drops or even hotel stays during or at the end of their journey. Technology not only makes the decision-making process easier and more valuable for passengers, but it also adds a viable revenue stream for the railway.
Creating  flawless experiences: It is the most effective way to increase customer loyalty and generate revenue. Nowadays, customers are expecting convenience, effectiveness, and personalization. Railways should look for ways of providing ease, comfort, convenience, and, most importantly, value for money.

Reducing costs: Rail technology should focus on cost reduction rather than increasing production to be more profitable.

REZOPIA SMART RAIL RESERVATION SYSTEM

Rezopia offers the next generation rail reservation, operations, and distribution management system for rail providers. We have built the world's most advanced and intuitive rail operations system to manage services, schedules, inventory, fares, and fare rules enabling rail providers to improve customer service.

Through Rezopia's support of multiple distribution channels, you can scale revenues by selling directly through your website, call center, and train stations, as well as selling through your network of travel agents, corporations, and XML connectivity.

The reservations module provides advanced functionality to search and book, manage customer profiles, discounts and promotions, seat maps, automatic email and SMS notifications, and social network integrations. You can also generate ancillary revenue by packaging rail with other travel products such as hotels, cars, attractions, and flights.

About Sonata:
Sonata is a global technology company that helps businesses establish connected, open, intelligent, and scalable businesses by enabling effective platform-based digital transformation efforts. Sonata’s Platformation™ methodology brings together industry expertise, platform technology excellence, design-led innovation, and strategic engagement models to deliver sustained, long-term value to customers. A trusted partner of world leaders in the Retail, Manufacturing, distribution, travel, services, and software industries, Sonata’s solution portfolio includes its digital platforms such as Brick & Click Retail Platform©, Modern Distribution Platform©, Rezopia Digital Travel Platform©, 

Sonata's Platformation realisation services have been specifically designed to enable the implementation of services on Microsoft Dynamics 365, Microsoft Azure, AWS, Cloud Engineering, Managed Services, as well as new digital technologies such as IoT, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning.

Sonata’s people and systems are nurtured to bring together the depth of thought leadership, customer commitment, and execution excellence to make a difference in business with technology.

Firms need a digital transformation strategy for a variety of reasons. It improves the culture of your firm, streamlines operations, boosts productivity, and boosts performance. 

The correct digital transformation framework can make a tremendous impact on the efficiency of your organization. You receive the benefit of flexibility by adopting best practices for your digital transformation framework, which allows you to add and remove digital solutions as your company's needs evolve.

Many firms are attempting large-scale change efforts to exploit the benefits of these trends. Quite a few also attempt this just to keep up with competition as digital technologies profoundly transform industry after industry.

Digital Transformation Framework

We live and operate in a cloud-based world. Without the cloud, big data, APIs, IoT, machine learning, artificial intelligence, automation, and mobile technologies, the number of variables affecting competitive advantage in today's market has multiplied. All of this necessitates the creation of a framework that allows everything to work in harmony.

A framework is a necessary component of any project. Anything you construct without it will be weak and short-lived. The same may be said of your digital transformation strategy. It serves as the foundation for all software programs and processes used by your company now and in the future.

A digital transformation framework can be defined as the use of appropriate technologies to improve existing processes with the ultimate goal of increasing the customer experience. Your framework serves as a road map for your digital ecosystem, allowing you to stay competitive in an ever-changing business environment.

Your digital transformation strategy should be a long-term plan that includes ideas for modifying or upgrading existing workflows using technology assets. You'll have more control over your data and processes with the correct digital transformation projects, which will help you manage it in beneficial ways to improve your existing workflows.

Overall, if new data or trends prompt you to update your tools or processes, your digital transformation framework is the place to start. Using our unique technique - Platformation^TM - Sonata Software has been assisting businesses in accelerating their digital transformation journey for the past decade. The platformation approach from Sonata Software walks a company through the whole platform adoption process, from establishing its vision to selecting a suitable strategy and putting in place a platform adoption roadmap.

Why do you need Digital Transformation Framework?

Technology and changing client expectations are driving digital transformation. On both counts, software integrations are beneficial. Fortunately, a record number of innovative options are hitting the market. This is in stark contrast to the pre-technology era when innovative solutions disturbed the commercial environment and the market eventually stabilized.

While having too many options is a nice thing to have, the rapid pace of new software solutions makes it difficult for business owners to choose which ones are best for their organization.

Here are some of the issues that businesses have been dealing with:

• Legacy systems require a significant on-premise system.
• Cloud technology is evolving rapidly.
• Endpoint management
• How to deal with organizational, regulatory, and geographic constraints.

What are the steps for creating a Digital Transformation Framework?

1. Approach digital transformation from a holistic, company-wide perspective.
2. Create processes that are focused on the consumer. Begin with the customer's perspective. Your digital tools should work in tandem with your operating system.
3. Have a comparison point. Conduct an audit to establish a baseline against which you can compare your current situation.
4. Identify the problems that your customers are having.
5. Use ideal customer profiles to pinpoint your target market.
6. Create a journey map for your customers.
7. Create a complete ecosystem of technologies that work together to share information and synchronize data.
8. Have the proper people on your team. Train them on how to make the most of the resources in your digital ecosystem to improve the customer experience.
9. Learn, assess, and analyze with your team members

Sonata Software specializes in building platforms and frameworks to accelerate your digital transformation journey. Watch out for this space for more updates. Worried about your digital transformation journey? Reach out to us today and, we will show you the way forward.
 

Digital transformation roadmap has become the driving force behind every successful company. This transformation roadmap has created numerous opportunities for innovation across all industries and, the world is witnessing a complete reinvention of the way of doing business be it products, services, and customer experiences being delivered to the market.

The question is, how the future looks like? Since the inception of social media, the Internet of Things, mobile, and technologies like AI/VR - the dynamics of the market has changed completely. We are living in an era where digital stores are gradually replacing physical stores. The line between the two has blurred increasingly, and there is a need to adapt to the digital transformation framework.

Digital transformation is a complex process that changes how enterprises work and go to market, which creates a long-term opportunity for partners equipped to take customers on this ongoing digital journey. This is why we thought this is a perfect opportunity to share a few tips and recommendations from Sonata Software that may help you think clearly for your digital strategy ahead.

At least 60% of companies worldwide are now implementing digital transformation strategies. IDC forecasts that the digital transformation opportunity will exceed $20 trillion, or 20% of global GDP. As per a report, in 2019, businesses worldwide invested $1.7 trillion across the IT spectrum and focused on implementing digital transformation solutions.

Many of these enterprises are investing more in modern digital platforms and cloud services as innovative business models are at the heart of this changing era. Born digital players have proved that a platform strategy is the best bet for the enterprise to grow and remain competitive in the market. What enterprises must do is to take the digital platform strategy to their advantage and build an ecosystem of customers, partners, and suppliers.

Let us have a look at a few key digital transformation trends that will dominate in 2021:

Digital Platforms and Ecosystems

Enterprise will undergo a full organization-wide digital platform strategy that will be the core of this transformation change. They will build ecosystems that will engage the larger picture. Instead of going narrow with a just technology focus, this approach has much bigger implications.

Cloud

Needless to say, cloud applications will explode. The sheer benefit of migrating from Capex to Opex is just cannot be ignored. Enterprises will spend on cloud services, cloud-enabling hardware, software and services, creating a $500 billion opportunity and a diversified cloud environment.

Hyper agile applications

Enterprises will also make a shift towards creating a hyper agile architecture. It’s inevitable. IDC predicts that by 2021, over 80% of the application development on cloud platforms (PaaS) using microservices and cloud functions, and over 95% of new microservices deployed in containers will be hosted on a hyper agile architecture that will ensure a faster and scalable framework.

Reimagined customer engagement

Tailored made customer experience will be created by leveraging customer data for actionable insights. This kind of personalized digital experience with targeted offers and specific recommendations will help create an unforgettable brand experience. The investments made in big data, analytics, AI, and CRM, to facilitate customer engagement will eventually pay off.

Optimizing business operations

The business needs to be uber responsive and, this can be achieved by improving service levels and reducing operational costs. All the products and service needs to be re-imagined in a digital context. The operations need to be transformed into more adaptive, agile, and efficient in meeting internal needs and customer requirements. The opportunity can be done with digital platforms is enormous and, we are just staring at the starting point. We need to put the larger picture always in the perspective. Just focusing on the technology itself won’t suffice. The right mix of business and tech strategy together will bring value to the overall digital platform strategy. That is why at Sonata our Platformation™ strategy is paying off well for our customers accelerating their digital agenda and scale. We would love to hear your take on what are your top business priority that is aligned to the larger picture.

FAQs

What is digital transformation?

Digital transformation is a process of reinventing enterprises completely using digital technologies and frameworks. The core of digital transformation relies on creating amazing customer experiences and creating a connected ecosystem. Digital transformation starts and ends with the customers which have pushed all the enterprises towards crafting unique user journeys.

Why is digital transformation important?

Digital transformation has become the core of successful companies. It has become mandatory to help enterprises in keeping up with changing customer demands and adapt to the changing technology. Especially after the onset of COVID 19, the world has seen huge demand for digital platforms and, every company is moving towards the same. The new normal era is all about transforming companies digitally.

What is the future of digital transformation?

Companies are spending a major portion of their budget on implementing digital transformation strategies. IDC has predicted that by 2023, the global investment is about to reach a staggering $2.3 trillion. It is also expected that companies will move from Business to Business (B2B) to Business-to-Business-to-Consumer (B2B2C) keeping customer experience as the core of it. 

What are the emerging trends in digital transformation?

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are expected to revolutionize the manufacturing industry. Companies are looking at cloud-based implementations and, there will be a significant rise in the use of the Internet of Things (IoT). It is expected to increase by 43 billion by 2023, as per a report from McKinsey.

Sonata Software specializes in building platforms and frameworks to accelerate your digital transformation journey. Watch out for this space for more updates. Worried about your digital transformation journey? Reach out to us today and, we will show you the way forward.

Using digital solutions to transform your business.

Every enterprise is going through a massive digital transformation. In the past few years, the term digital transformation has taken over the entire world. Every company is trying to make its mark in the digital space using technologies and solutions to fulfill the needs of its customers, partners, and suppliers.

Enterprises also must reimagine their existing business model to reap digital benefits. Customer expectation is changing rapidly due to the availability of a vast amount of information and dynamic demands. There is a value gap created between what the customers want and what the enterprises can fulfill.

Companies must work hard to close this value gap or it creates risk for the entire business. The born-digital players are already disrupting the traditional business approach. Every enterprise must start to think like them to stay relevant or competitive. If you look at the reason behind the underlying success of these born-digital players, they can imagine their business on a platform business model.

A platform business model is a radical shift from the traditional pipe business model where the operation was linear. Here the platform business engages the larger ecosystem of the customer, partners, and suppliers and can leverage the underlying value of data through digital technologies.

The old ways are coming to an end and, it is paving the way to the new ways of doing business. Traditional enterprises must start to think like technology companies. Part of that has to be the imagination of the business by itself. It needs some critical questions to be answered such as:

• What changes and improvements in the business process must be done?
• How can value be created with help of the ecosystem by involving customers, suppliers, and partners?
• What are the current technology gaps that need to be addressed to accelerate the digital processes?

Companies must be able to distinguish between digitalization and digital transformation. The two terms are often used interchangeably but they carry a different meaning when comes to shaping your digital enterprise.

Digitalization is a silo approach of using digital technologies to increase productivity and efficiency of the business process without changing the existing one. While digital transformation is changing the business completely using digitalization.

At Sonata, we help customers reimagine their business with the help of Platformation™ and help them in their digital transformation journey. Platformation™ is Sonata’s unique approach to help enterprises to think like born-digital companies with help of our proprietary 16-point technology framework, digital maturity studies, and digital consulting. This helps enterprises to become Open, Connected, Scalable, and Intelligent. It embodies the platform development intricacy with its proven framework that helps enterprises accelerate the digital agenda.

It is quite evident that digital is here to stay and, if your enterprise needs to stay competitive and have an edge over the competition, they must start to think like platform companies.

Hyper-Automation is an end to end automation process which includes the power of multiple technologies, from Robotic Process Automation (RPA) to Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Tools like RPA, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence operating to automate complex business processes, Including where subject matter experts were once required. Hyper-Automation is a means for real digital transformation.

Hyper-Automation is the continuing integration of software into the business processes. This is similar to more machines doing more things. It is the next step of digital transformation for businesses to remain competitive. If you're a digital company, you’re probably familiar with many of the automation benefits, such as:

• Consistent products and services
• More efficient products and services
• Fewer errors in the supply chain
• More effective use of data throughout the business

How is Hyper-Automation Different from Regular Automation? 

When the term automation comes, terms like Robotic Process Automation will come to mind first. But hyper-Automation takes an ecosystem of technologically advanced tools and combines them to create a new way to automation.

It means that low-value tasks with automation software, machine learning and advanced artificial intelligence are performed optimally so that outputs can be generated automatically and run efficiently with little or no human interference. Hyper-Automation will then build, together with humans, a workforce that is always aware, agile are able to use data and insights for fast and accurate decision-making.

How does Hyper-Automation work? 

According to Gartner, RPA enriched by AI & ML becomes the core enabling technology of Hyper-Automation. Combining RPA and AI Technologies offers the power and flexibility to automate where automation was never possible before, undocumented processes that rely on unstructured data inputs.

Types of automation that comprise Hyper-Automation:

• Robotic Process Automation
• Intelligent Document Processing
• Intelligent Process Discovery
• Advanced Analytics
• Digital Operational Tools
   

Benefits of Hyper-Automation:

Workforce enablement: Employees are able to automate many processes within their role, and get more jobs done, faster, with the resources available to them. Minimizing manual tasks enables them to focus on more impactful work, like planning and strategy.

Employee upskilling: With automation no longer reliant solely on IT, any business user can become an automation leader within their own department, benefiting both tech and non tech-minded employees. 

Systems integration: With Hyper-Automation, a company’s advanced technology and data systems can communicate seamlessly with the power of integrations.

Digital agility: With all modes of automation working closely together, the business will step beyond a single technology's one-off advantages to a state of true digital agility and versatility at scale.

Return on investment: Businesses can monitor the exact ROI realized based on the automated processes, streamlined operations, and saved time and money on a weekly, monthly, and annual basis using key analytics. End-to-End process automation: automation alone can complete single and simple tasks. Intelligent automation can focus on entire processes that contain both structured and unstructured data.

Path to Hyper-Automation:

Why Hyper-Automation is going to be a top digital strategy for 2020 and beyond:

Hyper Automation offers a lot of benefits to the business by giving access to collaborative intelligence where humans and technology work side by side so that they can perform their roles optimally. As employees don’t need to perform repetitive tasks, they can be educated to work with automation tools, wisely and with intention, and learn the latest business and marketplace information through machine learning. They can also teach how to interpret AI-enabled decision-making, find creative solutions to resolve problems and get more engaged with their business.

Once Hyper-Automation is incorporated into your business it will help to reduce human effort by doing a lot of work in a lesser amount of time, reduce the risk of human errors as machines are calibrated for precision, improve the quality of jobs by eliminating deadly, exhausting, and dangerous for humans processes and leads to increased productivity and higher output.

But before any implementations, companies must think and identify areas and processes where automation is really needed.  Business leaders must make a business plan and estimate the return on investment, and of course train existing personnel to make the most of automation instead of thinking that automation will take their job.

Hyper-Automation in Energy & Utilities and Oil & Gas Industries:

Hyper-Automation can help to build bots that carry out business processes intelligently to help start Hyper-Automation of the energy trading industry. Some of the relevant use cases are given below. 

Oil & Gas Industry:

• Hyper-Automation of upstream operations
• Data Entry & Reporting of exploration & production
• Audit trail and inspections
• Contract man power management
• Data Analytics and Lease Management

Mining Industry:

• Tenement Management
• Manufacturing or Plant data updating
• Financial Department Reports
• Attendance and timing monitoring of Employees
• Contracts process management
• Stock Management

Utilities Industry:

• Data validation and customer onboarding
• Order Management
• Financial department Reporting
• Energy trading transaction reconciliation

Hyper-Automation mistakes to avoid:

• Without any business process strategy or plan starting Automation
• Automating processes before they’re optimized
• Automating the wrong processes
• Automating unknown processes 

Hyper-Automation does not mean the end of human resource jobs; rather, it will focus more on value-based roles. Providers of Data Analytics services understand that machine learning helps businesses stay abreast with competitors. Machine learning algorithms can more efficiently identify data patterns and trends and generate different scenarios. This technology can increase productivity, save time and reduce costs. It also makes Automation services effortless by eliminating possible human errors. The application is very useful to all leading content management solutions, healthcare organizations, and pharmaceutical companies running clinical trials, law firms, insurance companies, remote sales offices, and any other industry that processes a large number of forms every day. 

In this fast-paced digital age, enterprises need to transform the way they do business, Today’s customers expect a customized and seamless experience no matter where and how (online or offline) they want to access your services or buy your products, customers also want new product features and new experiences faster, In short, since they have so many options to choose from, the attention span of the customer has reduced.

And Enterprises must fight it out to remain at the center of the customer's attention span, there are multiple business tricks that enterprises must deploy to gain that attention span, such as providing Customized and seamless user experience irrespective of their geography or the mode of interaction (Online or offline), To achieve such results Enterprises must be able to analyses and predict the market behavior in advance and release products and features that are always ahead of the market Curve.

However, to achieve such expertise and capabilities, enterprises must be able to understand the mood of the "Market and the customers" in advance and they should be able to deliver the desired user experience to the customer, partners, stakeholders, etc faster.

To implement these business/customer needs, enterprises need an equally competent technology/tool stack and processes that can capture data from disparate sources, analyze the captured data, scale up or scale down as the business needs and new platform features and updates that can release faster to market, we have identified that these changes can be achieved by embarking on a "Digital Business Transformation" journey.

Today's Business are achieving these capabilities by visualizing their business as an evolving platform and by Introducing modern business platforms into their existing practices.

These Modern Business platforms have some of the following standard tenets such as

Open: The platform should be able to onboard new stakeholders (New Customers, partners, suppliers, etc) with ease.

Connected: the platform should be able to connect to a varied set of systems through API's or connectors.

Intelligent: All the data that is collected should materialize into some valuable insights that will help the enterprise take decisions for Customization, Predictive Analysis, reporting Etc that’s when the platform must have the "intelligent tenets"

Scalable: Due to the highly flexible nature of today’s modern business, the platform should be able to scale up or down as per the business needs and add new features and Functionalities easily to the platform

As enterprises are creating New Data platforms, and Developing/Deploying new platforms by Modernizing the UI/UX of these platform with modern technology stack such as App Services, Functions, Gateways etc, the development process to build these applications is also changing, with the introduction of DevOps framework, enterprises are now changing the cultural mindset of the enterprises and paving the way for rapid experimentation and continuous change, DevOps implementation requires intense collaboration between different Development, testing and Deployment teams.

And since the technology is changing so quickly, it virtually impossible for a single team to understand everything, that’s why teams are made to focus of smaller domains by essentially breaking down the applications into smaller parts with "Microservices", without such architecture the fast pace of digital transformation will not be possible.

Microservices architecture helps in composing the application into individual, autonomous functions, and where each function is hosted independently by the (Function as a Service) FaaS provider, with this Enterprises can put their complete focus on the platform/application code as the hosting environment / Infrastructure is taken care by the FaaS provider,

FaaS is also called Serverless architecture and it’s now becoming easier than ever to create small, targeted microservice architecture using a variety of services. Azure provides an ideal platform for hosting microservices because it offers managed services that allow developers to create microservices that can run reliably and at scale.

Functions: It allows developers to use a number of languages to create “functions” to perform a task. The events can be raised by another service running on cloud or by a custom trigger, azure functions support several different languages and it can scale infinitely to support complex and heavy workloads.

Service Fabric: It consists of compute nodes which are managed by Azure and it addresses the challenges in developing and managing cloud applications by allowing the developer to focus on implementing mission-critical workloads that are scalable, reliable, and manageable, service fabric are very easy to manage, highly reliable and they are highly scalable.

Serverless architecture can be cost-effective solution for businesses with high degree of variance in their technology usage, enterprise need to modernize their legacy applications into modern platforms by architecting the application with Modern technologies (Microservices, containers etc) and practices (DevOps etc), Since in a Serverless architecture or FaaS environment enterprises only pay for the time their function gets called, rather than paying to have the application always on and waiting for requests on different instances, enterprises end up saving cost.

Following DevOps process in building platforms requires a resilient, dynamic and observable technology stack that enables it to support more rapid changes in the platform, such a technology stack can only be achieved by embarking on a digital business transformation journey.

While digital transformation is not a one-Off activity, it is an ongoing process of keeping up with the changing needs of the business and enabling them to be always ahead of the Curve in identifying new business avenues and new Business prospects.

It is no secret that Enterprises are putting significant investments in Digital Transformation. However, A study reveals that 90% of all digital projects fail because most enterprises believe the concoction of adopting digital technologies to modernize existing applications or simply adopting new technology solutions will do the trick.

That’s not true, because REAL digital transformation needs new principles and application of those new principles to architect business processes and solutions.

That’s When Sonata comes IN with our Trademarked Platformation Framework,

What is platformation

Well platformation is a trademarked term coined by Sonata Software, it essentially says that for enterprises to survive in this modern business arena, they need to modernize the way they do business, Today enterprises need to collaborate with multiple companies, they need to reach customers faster and they should be able to adapt to the changing market needs at a faster rate

Sonata's Platformation™ framework outlines ways to identify the applications that are critical to your business and that are not critical to your business, this process is called digital profiling of your applications and application stack.

Applications which are not critical to your business may not require modernization, but they can be modified using serverless architectures in cloud that will minimize the cost of running them and also optimized to extract maximum benefits.

However, the applications which are critical for your business to operate smoothly, actually needs detailed attention, they need to be investigated thoroughly, their architecture needs to be understood thoroughly, their dependencies mapped thoroughly and then identify the right technologies such as (containers, app services etc.) to be used to modernize the application.

Identifying the right set of applications to be migrated and Modernized with the right kind of technology / features is essentially Platformation framework,

Then Comes Sonata’s trademarked and unique Platform Engineering Methodology

Platform engineering methodology guides us in modernizing application in such a way that they can support and complement modern digital infrastructure stack, Sonata believes Modern applications should have traits like Open, Scalable, connected and Intelligent, and these traits can only be achieved when we design application and their architectures to take advantage of the modern technologies with the help of sonata's proprietary tools and frameworks, this approach will help us create these cloud-native applications at scale that are truly modern and that compliments your organizations growing requirements and growth ambitions.

Conclusion

And to achieve true Digital transformation Enterprises must Re-Imagine their complete digital Stack, simply Modernizing their legacy application and infrastructure stack will not be sufficient, they need a competent partner who has Skills, Certifications, Capabilities, and Tools to execute such platforms.

Read more about Sonata’s Platformation™ & Platform Engineering Services.

Contents

Why AI projects fail?3

Unrealistic expectations4

Wrong problem statement4

Wrong understanding of business4

Wrong Data4

Data size4

Limited EDA (Exploratory Data Analysis)4

Wrong tools, model and people4

Wrong success metrics5

Conclusion:5

Making AI Success

In the last few years there has been a surge in the interest towards AI, which can be quantified based on the relevant Google searches over the past 5 years.

Enterprises are investing in AI and implementing AI projects. Based on a PwC research around 80% of companies have implemented AI in some capacity:

• 20% of enterprises plan to deploy AI Enterprise wise
• 21% have already implemented AI in multiple areas
• 15% pPlan to deploy AI in multiple areas
• 16% have implemented pilot projects within discrete areas
• 22% are investigating use of AI

Source: https://www.pwc.com/us/en/services/consulting/library/artificial-intelligence-predictions-2019.html

The AI market is growing and set for exponential growth in the near future. The global business value derived from artificial intelligence (AI) is projected to reach $3.9 trillion in 2022, as predicted by Gartner Inc.

But Gartner also predicts that 85% of AI projects will fail. Which leads us to the next question on:

Why do AI projects fail?

There are multiple reasons due to which an AI project fails. Avoiding these can help you to make your AI/ML project a measurable success

Unrealistic expectations – with so much buzz going around AI and companies (service providers, ISVs, etc.) making AI sound very easy to achieve, businesses perceive AI as a magical wand that provides a simple solution to their challenges with minimal efforts.

Wrong problem statement – defining the problem statement is very important for the successful implementation of AI within the organization. Problem statements need to focus on the end goal of the AI project. This will lead to framing the actual outcome from the AI project in terms of increasing efficiency or reducing cost, more accurate. This is one of the key focus areas and can help make or break the AI initiatives.

Wrong understanding of business – understanding business processes is very important for building accurate machine learning models to solve business problems. Without understanding business processes, AI/ML projects face a much higher risk of failure.

Wrong Data – having wrong/ faulty data can lead to a “Garbage in, Garbage out” Scenario. This leads to wrong models & inaccurate predictions

Data size - other issues for AI/ML project failures is due to the availability of too little or too much input datasets for model building. Not enough data due to security reasons or unavailability due to other reasons can lead a limited number of features for model building and possible scenario of not having enough input data points for model building. Having too much data can have potential to fail the AI/ML project as it requires more processing power, time, removing feature, etc.

Limited EDA (Exploratory Data Analysis) – EDA is the most important step of any AI/ML project as it helps in building the understanding of the data, do statistical modeling for removing outliers, identifying significant features, feature engineering, etc. But at the same time, it’s the most ignored task of an AI/ML project. Putting insufficient resources for EDA leads to increased time & cost in the later stages of the AI/ML project.

Wrong tools, model and people – tools, models and people make the AI/ML project a success. Selecting the wrong tool for development can produce suboptimal analytics pipelines. Model performance depends on the domain and the underlying training dataset. It is important to use different models and multiple iterations to find the best model to solve the given problem while trading over accuracy, complexity & time.

Having the right team involving skills of Data engineers, Data science engineers, Data scientists, Architecture can make the AI/ML project a resounding success.

Wrong success metrics and not defining Failure metrics – setting up too rigid a success criteria & not defining failure metrics often leads to failure of the AI project. Identifying current heuristics is also very important which will tell you what will happen if AI is not implemented.

Enterprises would do well to keep the above possible pitfalls while planning their next AI/ML project and making it an overwhelming success.

To know more about our capabilities, you can reach out to us at info-Data&Analytics@sonata- software.com

What are your digital imperatives? Is moving to a platform business model one of them? You may ask what it could mean for you. Well here’s the answer – It is a series of technological solutions that provide outcomes in terms of business innovation and efficiency, as well as customer experience that is truly transformational. This means that a total digital transformation would help businesses cater to changing demands of the customer.

From being digitally challenged in in the 90s to early 2000, where there was simply one way communication and mass media was the only medium of engagement, we are still witnessing some small, as well as large organizations and enterprises who are non-platform based and who are especially in need of a digital platform strategy, are still struggling with adjusting to the new trends. They want the benefits of technology – heightened social media presence - mobile connection, Cloud, Data and Analytics, etc., but they don’t know how to create a strong digital culture to support it. Enterprises based on platform business model, that are empowered digitally are ideally centered on the use of various devices, such as the mobile or tablet for instance – where they have become the center of customer experience and engagement. Also, what we’ve seen with a clear digital platform strategy they are hyper personalized engagements that are facilitated via insights, and increased loyalty to the brand is engendered - as a result of genuine value creation, apart from giving customers discounts, coupons or points.

Companies that are based on platform business model are defined by an ecosystem of value seekers and providers. For eg., Airbnb’s (a platform business model) ecosystem comprises hosts and guests, where the host is essentially a value provider, who is offering a place to stay to the guest, with the guest being the value seeker. To reiterate, value is created by the host and derived by the guest, as with the case of the digitally enabled, Airbnb. Further, one needs to take cognizance of 16 point framework to get digitally enabled and cause that transformation. This framework entails the following attributes which are encapsulated in the image below:

These attributes meet the needs of the digital business era with respect to both, business and technology. So determine what your priority is. Implement elements of ecosystem thinking, value enhancements based on data, and agile innovation of primary systems and get that transformation through the digital platform strategy approach.

So why a platform business model approach? Platforms typically help your organization be extremely flexible to deal with advancing capabilities and subsequently, process changes throughout the transformation journey, which enables a swifter time-to-market with minimal risks. Further, there is a need for a digital platform strategy & approach to conveniently break organizational silos, expand and stretch beyond front, middle and back office processes.

Platform business model adopted by billion dollar companies, such as Airbnb, Uber, Alibaba and Amazon, have proved that, ideation that is backed by commitment to adding real value matters, and nothing else. Also, the ability to initiate with the available resources can do mighty good by bringing out the ‘extraordinary,’ than scouting for something that is superficially great. The former is what these platform business model based companies did and this is why you need to take the plunge and go digital.

Take the case of Uber (or the other a platform business model), we can see that they brought out the “extraordinary” factor by displaying four key characteristics – They are Open, Connected, Intelligent and Scalable. Uber allows for efficient matching from a large pool of drivers and riders, also allowing you to place orders for food on-the-go, showing they are open. Secondly, matching drivers and riders with other parties seamlessly proves they are connected. Using algorithms, understanding copious amounts of data generated by riders and drivers can be garnered - For eg, monitoring traffic conditions, travel times between various places, etc, makes the platform intelligent. Lastly, Uber’s model is replicable, meaning the ease of business to scale drivers, riders and to replicate their business in new cities is due to the scalable nature of the platform.

Haven’t you seen other platform business models possessing similar traits? So now here’s what you should be doing – Use digital platform strategy to digitally transform your respective industries.

Your ways of working on thinking platform strategy and taking the digital route simply means adding novelty to the new, allowing you to make unconventional choices, where embracing a changeless façade in changing scenarios becomes the primary manner of operating. Meaning? Use existing resources (as in the case of Uber), build on them or create them from scratch even as times change. Not only will this be a consistent way of doing things for your digital imperatives, but is also a fully functional and productive way of conducting your business and you will only stand to gain with the platform-led enterprise digital transformation approach. This will not only positively impact ROI, but also allow you to have a greater reach in terms of building your customer base.

Take the right steps now and go digital. Stay current, stay in the know, broaden your vision, and decide. In other words, be open, connected, scalable, and act with intelligence today. Your decision!

To know more about accelerating your Digital Transformation Roadmap click here