Digital

The world is going digital. That is not news anymore, but the pace at which technology is transforming all walks of business is something that cannot be ignored. A clear digital transformation roadmap will determine who wins the digital divide. We are at the cusp of what the World Economic forum calls The 4th Industrial revolution. The physical and the digital worlds are converging, giving birth to platforms that are scaling new digital players to greater heights. The Amazon, Uber and Alibaba’s of the world are constantly challenging the status quo of what the traditional enterprises have been dominant for years, if not decades.

What does this mean for the traditional players? You can no longer afford to be on the sidelines as the economic moat has been put to threat by these digital natives. You have to innovate and re-imagine your business to be ready for this digital war. In this highly competitive market whoever gets closer to the customer, wins and it starts with a successful digital transformation roadmap.

There are two major factors on which a successful digital transformation roadmap hinges on. A clear business goal that defines your digital vision for your enterprise and a matching technology enablement. First you need to understand where you are in your digital journey. The best way to judge is to get a digital maturity assessment done to measure the gap between your digital vision and current business landscape. One critical thing to keep in mind that enterprise digital transformation is a marathon, not a sprint. It is not a one- time big bang activity but a multiyear continuous program that evolves as the enterprise mature in its digital journey.

Creating a Digital transformation roadmap is not just an IT project but it’s re-imagining your business of the future that requires serious stakeholder commitment from the management. If these projects are executed in silos the benefits will never be realized and it would have higher chances of failing, putting the enterprises in a vicious cycle of failed projects and opportunity costs.

Here are the following techniques & strategies you can use in your enterprise to start planning your digital journey:

1. Creating Digital Vision & Goal

Vague goals leads to vague results. In order to create a successful enterprise digital transformation program, you need to create a digital vision for your organization. What is that you are going to achieve by going digital? What are your goals? You need to have clarity around them before you proceed to the next steps of your digital journey.

2. Stakeholder Identification

As we said earlier, enterprise digital transformation is about re-imagining your business and that needs a serious commitment from management. You need to identify a digital champion in your organization that will steer the entire program over the years. This can be the CEO himself/herself or a Chief Digital Officer who will report in directly to the CEO, so that you never lose sight of the bigger picture. You need to identify the stakeholders from both business and IT who will be responsible for the various facets of your digital program. Combine this with a governance program that monitors all the nuts and bolts of the project through the steering committee that ensures the project is on track and always on the prime agenda of the management.

3. Design Thinking

An organization are its people and to foster true innovation, design thinking is one of the best ways to go about it. Design Thinking is a systematic process of thinking which empowers even the most traditional thinker to develop new, innovative solutions to the problem at hand. It empathizes with your customer’s problems as well the people in your organization who will be responsible for solving those problems. A design thinking led innovation technique can create synergies between the business and IT to look at business challenges in a newer light.

4. Ecosystem approach to business

If you look at the born digital companies and the factors leading up to their success you will find a common theme. They all have created an ecosystem to connect the suppliers and providers. This is a significant shift from the traditional pipe based models where the approach was a linear one. At simple level the ecosystem enables a network of value seekers and providers, systems that enable value exchange between them and underlying data that powers matching of value across participants. So in order for your enterprise to be digital it must accommodate a larger ecosystem at play that makes it scalable.

5. Platform Strategy

This perhaps is the most important step in your digital transformation roadmap. To complement the ecosystem approach to business, the enterprise itself needs to reimagine itself as a platform business. Amazon, Uber, Airbnb are all examples of platform businesses that serves customer through the value they bring in with their model. Thus your platform is a connected ecosystem of customers, business, vendors and partners, intelligent decisions driven based on data generated by the ecosystem and open, flexible scalable systems that enable innovation and execution. Platforms leverage data generated from the ecosystem to drive intelligence that enhances value.

6. Choosing the Right Digital Transformation Partner

Your enterprise may not have all the technical skillsets in-house to cater to your digital transformation. Hence you need to rely on a trusted digital transformation partner that will walk side by side with you on your digital transformation journey. While evaluating a digital transformation partner you must assess its technology capability, expertise in your industry and their ability to execute a platform led digital strategy successfully. For example, Sonata Software specializes in executing such platform based digital transformation programs. Our Platformation™ approach helps client re-imagine their business as open, connected, scalable and intelligent. You can learn more about Sonata Software’s Platformation™ approach here

7. Organizational Change management

A platform based digital transformation approach needs awareness, education and training. Communication plays a key role here. The first step can be a workshop that brings all the stakeholders together for opening minds to design thinking, persona mapping, and platform mindset. Through this workshop you can align and uncover potential themes for your digital transformation journey.

Digital transformation roadmap is not an easy journey. There are ups and downs as you progress towards your own. But it is an important journey to take if you want to stay relevant and continue to provide value to your customers.

To know more about accelerating your Digital Transformation roadmap click here

Choosing the right Digital Transformation Partner

The field of digital transformation is an extremely crowded one. You have probably read about business strategy and digital transformation roadmaps from more experts than you care to remember. Is there a quick and easy way to match business strategy to the right digital transformation partner?

Yes there is. But before we do that, it is important to understand what businesses really want.

They want to:

1. Build revenue streams - increase the top line
2. Reduce costs- increase bottom line
3. Be compliant with all relevant governance, risk and compliance regimes
4. In addition to these, companies also desire two other things:
5. Innovation- either create new products and services or if competitors have done so, then copy fast
6. Making their customers happy

For most companies, the last two will not be at the cost of the first three. Rather, creating innovative products and services can lead to happy customers, whose experience is enhanced or improved by the new offerings that differentiate the business from its competitors.

Enterprise Digital transformation

So what does enterprise digital transformation have to do with what companies really want in terms of selecting the right digital transformation framework?

If we understand the things that drive the actions and operations of a company at a fundamental level, then it is also clear that the new digital business paradigm has meant that there are clear winners, which are the born digital companies. Other than these clear winners, there are other companies, which were not born digital natives, but have successfully implemented a digital transformation roadmap and have established clear leadership and market shares in their respective industries and domains.

For the rest of the companies, there is no option but to quickly catch up.

How do you catch up?

You could engage a big, prestigious consulting company to charge you a lot of money and tell you what you already know. They will draw up a big, complex digital transformation framework that may or may not be relevant or customized to your business. The other option is to select companies that are actually able to implement your digital transformation roadmap for you.

So how does a successful digital transformation partner look like?

1. They have a clear idea about what it means to do digital transformation consulting, for your specific industry
2. They will have demonstrable successes in working with a number of customers within those specific industries
3. They are not just Powerpoint warriors. In other words, they have software IP, which they can bring to deploy and orchestrate, to accelerate your digital transformation roadmap and reduce the risks of the implementation and accelerate or compress the timelines to the end-state

The Powerpoint warriors also have IP, just that it is not the kind that will ultimately help you. Their IP is limited to Impressive Presentations and a handful of veterans ( you know, the 30+ years, global experience type), whose profiles look impressive. But what are the chances that those few experts will work with your business on a digital transformation framework?

You will find many companies talk about providing ‘digital transformation consulting ‘. This simple framework will help you test their claims effectively.

May you find the right digital transformation partner you are looking for, the future of your business will depend on it.

To know more about accelerating your Digital Transformation roadmap click here

Traditional retail has been affected by the rise of digital stores. To remain relevant and competitive, retailers need to find a balance between thinking like digitally native companies and delivering a differentiated in-store experience for a true retail digital transformation. Retailers must adopt a ‘customer first’ strategy along with a digital transformation framework that creates a highly targeted and personalized approach to cater to their customers’ needs and buying preferences. With these radical changes in the business, retailers must reimagine their business models, create a digital transformation roadmap, and add innovative capabilities to create differentiation.

Retailers need to integrate assets comprising of businesses, divisions, people, and technologies to remove the barriers between the physical and digital worlds. There will be several challenges that will be faced by retailers in their digital transformation journey. Many of those would be a technology issue such as retiring legacy applications and consolidation of siloed systems. However, the bigger challenge lies somewhere else. Change management and cultural shift become important issues to tackle which often makes it difficult to convert digital transformation efforts into business opportunities that produce measurable results.

According to research by the World Economic Forum, four digital transformation themes are expected to play an important role in the world of retail and consumer goods.

Consumer data flow and value capture:

Growing digitization will create opportunities for companies to use consumer data to propel innovation and improve customer experiences. Developing successful data monetization models will be a critical challenge for consumer industries. The rising importance of consumer and enterprise data will draw increased scrutiny and activism from consumers and regulators, as society puts an even higher premium on data privacy and transparency.

The experience economy:

Products will evolve into services, and services into experiences, with data serving as the backbone of their delivery. Creating new revenue models is an opportunity in an environment where revenue could potentially be decoupled from the output and more closely linked to outcomes for individuals and society.

Omni-channel retail:

Traditional stores will undergo a metamorphosis to stay relevant when online purchases in most categories are growing. Omni-channel strategies will play an important role. Consumer products companies will also need to have effective strategies to compete in a ‘flatter world’ and identify ways to replicate and maintain the quality of consumer experience across channels.

Digital operating model:

Smart supply chains and smart factories will be developed, enabling the mass customization of products and Omni-channel experiences. The ability of a firm’s operating model to manage consumer experiences will be central to gaining a competitive advantage.

Retailers need to find the right balance between technology and people strategy to create a unique buying experience for their customers. But technology is an Achilles' heel for the traditional retailers where legacy systems have been just enough to cut. But to compete with the digital natives, retailers need to create a whole new digital operating model. They can rely on a digital transformation partner to help them navigate through this transformation journey. In our previous article, we had shared some ideas about choosing the right digital transformation partner because the field of digital transformation is an extremely crowded one. You have probably read about business strategy and digital transformation roadmaps from more experts than you care to remember.

Once you have found your digital transformation partner the next step is to create a digital operating model that suits the needs of the enterprise. Retailers need to find a common operating model that aligns with all the major functional areas of the organization. Investing in digital technologies such as connected devices, sensors, and AI will allow the organization to revolutionize operations & functions that are crucial to the success of the business.

Case in point, one of Sonata’s customers, a leading activewear brand operating in Australia and the US was struggling with legacy systems that were not scalable and did not support multi-country operations and localization. Sonata’s unique Platformation™ approach helped the customer by creating a platform that streamlined their business operation to increase productivity. This platform now provides a base to grow organically and inorganically across geographies. The retailer has now seamless integration between 7 countries- the US, Australia, NZ, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, & Netherlands that supports multi-channel presence with country-specific localization and complying with statutory requirements.

At Sonata, we understand the core principles of retail and the emerging trends of digital transformation. Sonata Connected Retail specializes in developing platforms and frameworks to help you go to the next level of your digital transformation. Reach out to us right away, and we'll show you the way. 
 

A new phenomenon in global enterprise valuations

The last few years have seen a significant change in the valuation of companies across the globe. If you look at the top 10 companies in the world by their market capitalization from 2011 and onwards, you would notice that there has been a shift in the positions of these enterprises. A noticeable exit from the list has been that of Wal-Mart. The retailer’s spot in the top 10 appears to have been acquired by another retailer, Amazon. There are new entrants for the top spots who did not even exist in the last decade. Companies Facebook & Alibaba, have rapidly scaled compared to its peers.

What is the secret?

‘Born digital’ companies such as Amazon, Airbnb, Uber and Alibaba have built multi-billion dollar business at a never-before-seen speed in the corporate world. In achieving this, they fundamentally disrupted many traditional industries. If you carefully examine these companies, they all have one thing in common. They have a digital platform strategy through which they have been able to scale at such rapid speed. Let us step back and understand what we mean by a platform. Contrasting from the traditional pipe businesses which embody a linear value chain to transfer value (goods or services) downstream from factory to customer, a platform facilitates the interaction between producers and consumers and derives value from the interaction. Let us examine a business operating in the pipe business model, say Marriott. Marriott owns (or in some case leases) and manages the facilities where it operates. Marriott is also responsible for all aspects of service delivery for its guests: the accommodation, restaurants, room service, facilities at its hotels, etc. All services are also branded under the Marriott brand name, and recognized by guests, suppliers, regulatory bodies, etc. Contrastingly, a platform business such as Airbnb does not own any of the properties on its platform. Instead, it brings together three elements:

• An ecosystem of value seekers and value providers
• A system of exchanging value i.e. the transactions, and lastly,
• Data that empowers the platform

How to create a Digital Platform Strategy?

Enterprise businesses cannot change their business model overnight in order to compete with born-digital companies. However, they do enjoy certain distinct advantages when selecting adigital platform strategy.

Firstly, having been in the industry for long, enterprises often have the required relationships with customers, suppliers, and ancillary partners that can help them succeed in the platform age. Secondly, enterprises would also have deep knowledge and understanding of the market: of customer needs, segments, price points, and profitability. Lastly, enterprises can be expected to have good financial control and, more often than not, deeper pockets.

Firstly, having been in the industry for long, enterprises often have the required relationships with customers, suppliers, and ancillary partners that can help them succeed in the platform age. Secondly, enterprises would also have deep knowledge and understanding of the market: of customer needs, segments, price points, and profitability. Lastly, enterprises can be expected to have good financial control and, more often than not, deeper pockets.

Is there a framework or concept that can help achieve a successful digital platform strategy?

Digital transformation of businesses can be achieved through a platform-based approach that is focused on the nuances of the vertical or industry of operation. However, the ‘born digital’ players have been disrupting business not only with their platform business models — but also with their underlying platform approach to IT too. The technology environment, application build approach, and the IT operations model work together as one system.

For example at Sonata, we have a unique approach to Digital with Platformation™ that helps enterprises create a digital platform strategy by helping them becoming

Open - Easily accessible for users, ecosystem partners, and businesses to participate in.

Scalable - It gives the business the power to scale the platform by number of users, segments, and geography, easily

Connected - They are always-on, always connected

Intelligent - To use the data generated in the platform to enable more efficient and meaningful transactions

As a part of the initiation of ‘Platformation’, one would have to examine the opportunity that can be capitalized and then embark on a business as well as technology readiness assessment. The business maturity assessment would encompass three key dimensions — leadership and talent, vision and business model and execution approach. Similarly, the platform maturity assessment is also made on three dimensions — digital capability, data and architecture. The existing system’s capability to manage an ecosystem of stakeholders, the ability to leverage data for decision making and the level of flexibility in the application and infrastructure are assessed at this stage.

You can find out your organization’s digital maturity with this assessment. We will take your inputs and share a complimentary custom report within 7 working days from taking the survey.

It is time that for proactive business leaders, all significant new initiative be seen through a lens of platform-based business and technology models. Any attempt to launch it as a standalone siloed project will have a limited shelf life and potentially give a false sense of comfort in being prepared for the emerging digital economy. Since this is easier said than done, the key to successful digital transformation is to have a concept like ‘Platformation’ — in order to provide the road map that is required to get there. Successful digital business can only be built on a robust framework like ‘Platformation’ that appropriately combines the business and technology foundations needed to make a fundamental impact.

We are already 3months in for the year 2019. For a lot of enterprises their digital agenda is taking shape in forms of annual plans and business reviews. Digital transformation is a complex process that changes how enterprises work and go to market, which creates long-term opportunity for partners equipped to take customers on this on-going digital journey. Which 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.

With 60% of enterprises now implementing an organization-wide digital platform strategy, IDC forecasts that the digital transformation opportunity will exceed $20 trillion, or 20% of global GDP. Businesses worldwide are on course to invest $1.7 trillion in 2019 across the spectrum of IT (software, services, hardware), and partners focused on modern digital platforms and cloud services will see the majority of that spend.

Innovative business models and transformative technologies will be at the heart of this new change. 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 enterprise must do is to take the digital platform strategy to their advantage and build an ecosystem of customers, partners and suppliers.

“By 2019, IDC predicts all digitally transformed organizations will generate at least 45% of their revenue from “future of commerce” business models. And by 2020, in over half of Global 2000 firms, revenue growth from information-based products and services will be twice the growth rate of the balance of the portfolio.”

Perhaps the most neglected part in the digital transformation process is the business transformation. With so much focus on new technologies, the underlying business assumption takes a back seat and that is where so many digital projects do not succeed. We have to understand that business transformation is at the heart of the overall digital strategy change. IDC predicts a few key trends that will dominate the digital transformation opportunity.

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 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 micro services and cloud functions, and over 95% of new micro services deployed in containers will be hosted on a hyper agile architecture that will ensure 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 payoff.

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 needs to be transformed into more adaptive, agile, and efficient in meeting internal need and customer requirements.

The opportunity what 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.

The last couple of decades was the exponential growth of the internet era which got extremely pervasive. Now the whole world is well-connected thanks to digital. Historically businesses used to believe that they were the sole creators of value and it was a very linear value proposition that the business used to generate. It was a ‘pipe’ based value proposition because the value was created through raw materials, products, and services. With the internet and everything getting connected, businesses started to realize that they are no longer are the sole creator of value. You now have consumer getting connected to producers and consumers are getting more empowered than ever. So this ecosystem outside the organization that is really creating value has been formed. Suddenly we are witnessing traditional organizations getting disrupted by companies which they have not even thought of. So the industry in the industry segments is getting blurred. People are manufacturing industry could get disrupted by technologies and every company is becoming a technology company or have technology at the core of its operation. Hence we are witnessing these born-digital unicorns disrupting the traditional industry segments. For example, the largest taxi company that does not own a taxi and we have a company that does not want a single property but still, it's the largest hospitality accommodation company. So the impact of these born digital companies are for all to see.

Why these companies have been so successful? What is the secret behind their exponential growth?

For start, these companies are completely asset light. They're not physical asset heavy like the traditional counterparts. They have created a very unique approach to business based on the platform model.

What does this platform model really mean?

It's really about value creation and exchange between the producers the consumer in a nonlinear fashion. Here the ‘pipe’ based business model is being replaced with a ‘platform’ model that engages the larger ecosystem at play. So platforms are really an interplay between the value network and the value creation. Then you've got a very sophisticated technology layer that is orchestrating this value equation. Then the third one is all about data. The ability to make use of the underlying data that the business generates is really making this platform more intelligent and more self-learning.

Can traditional companies take a platform thinking approach to digital transformation?

As much as digital transformation is all pervasive, it's also very fuzzy at times. Everyone wants to go digital but not everyone is sure how to go about it. Every enterprise is focused on one or the other digital technology, but is there something more holistic approach that can be taken? Where to start? Is there a meaningful approach to digital?

We see that customers are really struggling with a meaningful approach. If you need to be a truly digital company then you have to look at how the true digital enterprise's functions. True digital businesses are those businesses that help you orchestrate value not just within your enterprise but can orchestrate the ecosystem in the right way. Enterprises need to ask some hard questions while creating a digital agenda. Can you be connected both internally as well as to your ecosystem? Can you be scalable right across businesses across locations across users? And can you be really intelligent? So that you can apply self- learning and harmonize those learnings onto your platform that engages your customer, suppliers, and partners.

This is still an evolving process and still, there is a lot of room for improvement and a lot of research that is going in. For example, at Sonata we have taken a deep dive approach through Platformation™ to make a practical value proposition for our customers. Depending on where our customers are on their digital journey, we have a very structured approach. We help our customers think like a born-digital company measure and harmonize with their digital strategy and where there are in the digital journey. We help our customers understand their digital maturity. Sonata has developed a unique digital maturity framework that analyzes where they are in the current digital journey and what are gaps. The first step to that is the maturity assessment that can be taken here – check Sonata’s Digital Maturity Assessment. We not only consult but also have strong execution capabilities as well where we help our customers build these digital platforms and the ecosystem at play.

It becoming very evident that in order for traditional enterprises to accelerate their digital journey, a platform thinking is the only way to succeed.

In this digital age, enterprises must change the way they interact with their customers, partners, and suppliers. Enterprises also must reimagine their existing business model to reap the benefit of digital. Customer expectation is changing rapidly due to the availability of a vast amount of information and dynamic demands. There is a value gap that is being created with what the customers want and what the enterprises are able to fulfill. Enterprises must work hard to close this value gap or its stands at risk for the entire business.

The born-digital players are already disrupting much of traditional business and they are very likely to reimagine some more and thereby putting the traditional enterprises on the defensive. These enterprises must start to think like them in order to stay relevant or competitive. If you look at the reason behind the underlying success of these born-digital players, it is their ability to imagine their business as 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 able to leverage the underlying value of data by means of digital technologies.

The 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 –

1. Given the huge amount of experience, the enterprise had if it had to start all over what changes and improvements in the process must be done?

2. How can value be created with help of the ecosystem by involving customers, suppliers, and partners

3. What are the current technology gaps that need to be addressed to accelerate the digital processes

Enterprises must be able to distinguish between digital strategy and digital transformation. The two terms are often used interchangeably but it does carry a different meaning when comes to shaping your digital enterprise. A digital strategy per se could be a silo approach of using digital technologies in one particular group of business such a supply chain operation or sales management or e-commerce for that matter where the enterprises are just looking to add one more channel for their customer acquisition. This approach is limited in the sense that it only addresses a part of the bigger problem.

Digital transformation, on the other hand, demands an overhaul of the business and building new and better ways of doing businesses. This requires a much more concrete effort right from top management commitment to execution to the lowest of the organization pyramid. This approach leverages digital technologies, tools, processes, and people to reorganize the business. This collaborative effort is a multiyear approach and if enterprises are serious about staying competitive, they must invest this time and energy to fix their business navigation. The old ways are coming to an end and it giving way for the new ways of doing business. It has always been so, right from the first industrial revolution of organized manufacturing to steam, we are in the age of the fourth industrial revolution now where digital will lead the way of change.

At Sonata, we help customers reimagine their business with the help of Platformation™ which is Sonata’s unique approach to digital with the help of platforms. We help enterprises to think like a born-digital company with help of Sonata’s proprietary 16 point technology framework, digital maturity study and digital consulting. This helps enterprises to become what we call it as Open, Connected, Scalable and Intelligent. It embodies the platform development intricacy with its proven framework that helps enterprise 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 otherwise they stand the risk of losing the very business.

Gartner predicts that by 2020, 75% of enterprises will transform to digital — or at least be preparing for the change. Unfortunately, only 30% of those attempts will be successful. As more and more businesses get involved with digitization, it is now essential to have a well-planned digital transformation strategy in place than ever before. Today’s enterprises must maintain reliability to ensure customer experience, uptime, security and compliance, while also seeking agility to enter new markets and remain competitive. With digital technologies affecting all walks of business, companies must transform themselves with digital to become ready for the future. Enterprise digital transformation is a complex process that requires the right mix of business and technology strategy. While most of the companies would agree that they are involved in some form of digital transformation solutions, getting the balance right has been a chronic issue that enterprises must solve.

Truth is enterprise digital transformation is not an isolated project that can be restricted just to the IT department. Digital transformation solutions transcend the traditional departmental boundaries. It affects the entire organization as a whole. It is a cultural shift that requires serious board room discussions. Digital transformation means different things to different companies. You need to understand what is the digital vision of your enterprise can aspire for. You may need to undergo a digital transformation consulting exercise to identify where you are and where you want to be. The organizations need to understand the intrinsic value that can be derived out of this exercise to make progress. There are digital transformation companies that help drive enterprise digital transformation. For example, at Sonata with our proprietary Platformation™ approach, we help our customers create a shared digital vision for the enterprise with a clear digital roadmap which is practical and executable.

We now have a raft of new, disruptive technologies ranging from Artificial Information (AI) to chat box to analytics to Robotic Process Automation (RPA), all of which collectively promise a massive breakthrough in performance. But enterprise must build capabilities around these technologies with a reference framework that works for them. Born digital’ companies such as Amazon, Airbnb, Uber, and Alibaba have built multi-billion dollar business at a never-before-seen speed in the corporate world by leveraging these technologies. In achieving this, they fundamentally disrupted many traditional industries and posed a serious challenge to some of the long-established companies in the field.

We now have a raft of new, disruptive technologies ranging from Artificial Information (AI) to chat box to analytics to Robotic Process Automation (RPA), all of which collectively promise a massive breakthrough in performance. But enterprise must build capabilities around these technologies with a reference framework that works for them. Born digital’ companies such as Amazon, Airbnb, Uber, and Alibaba have built multi-billion dollar business at a never-before-seen speed in the corporate world by leveraging these technologies. In achieving this, they fundamentally disrupted many traditional industries and posed a serious challenge to some of the long-established companies in the field.

The first step is to have an understanding of the current digital maturity of the enterprise. It is the starting point of your digital transformation program. For example, at Sonata we have developed a complimentary digital maturity assessment framework that provides you with an in-depth analysis of your current digital maturity. Our 7 steps digital transformation methodology helps enterprises chart their digital journey with help of the organizations’ strength and immediate digital priorities. The short assessment considers your business model, products and services as well as your processes. It’s the starting point for your individual digital transformation.

It is time that for proactive business leaders, all significant new innovation initiatives be seen through a lens of platform-based business and technology models. Any effort launched as standalone, isolated or point interventions will have a limited shelf-life and potentially give a false sense of comfort in being prepared for the emerging digital economy. Since this is easier said than done, the key to successful digital transformation is to have a concept like ‘Platformation’ — in order to provide the road map that is required to get there. Successful digital business can only be built on a robust framework like ‘Platformation’ that appropriately combines the business and technology foundations needed to make a fundamental impact.

Digital has become a core engine for every business. It has become the driving force behind organization strategies and change management. The CEOs are embracing the digital agenda as a base of their transformational strategy. CEOs have come to a realization that the digital strategy and leading enterprise digital transformation change can no longer be an isolated project anymore. The cost and the stakes involved are simply very high.

Recent research done by the World Economic Forum shows that about 70% of the CEOs they had interviewed did not have a formal digital background or expertise. Yet they are at the helm of leading the digital business change. They believed, they needed to focus on a digital transformation roadmap by building their digital capabilities, learning new skills and find trusted digital transformation consulting firms to help shape their decisions. For example, at Sonata we help CEOs assess their current digital maturity with help of a digital maturity assessment that helps them understand where they are in their current digital journey and how they can set the correct priorities and expand.

Data has become the new oxygen for the enterprises and CEOs are well cognizant of that fact. Critical business decisions are now made based on the data modeling and analytics-driven approach. From a customer perspective, the CEO makes it a personal responsibility to protect customer’s data, because they are well aware of the potential consequence if there is a major data loss on their watch.

A study made by Gartner said that only 4% of the enterprises have no digital initiatives. This is a significant shift of digital agenda as an option to the mainstream component of enterprise digital strategy. 33% of enterprises have now either been scaling or refining their digital strategy up from about 17% last year.

Supporting this scale of change has led to some significant change in the business models of the organization. One of the key ingredients behind the success of the ‘born digital’ players like Uber, Amazon are their ability to create a platform business model. This radical shift from a traditional pipe based model to platform approach has accelerated the process of enterprise digital transformation. For example at Sonata about two years ago we have a unique proprietary model of the digital transformation of enterprises – Platformation™. This was based on understanding and applying how successful born digital companies have been able to create extremely scalable and rapidly growing digital businesses. The ideas which we have adopted for Platformation is that first one needs to conceptualize a business model that is platform based, then identify how to create open, scalable, connected and intelligent platforms to support these platform-based business models. The key is to identify platforms that need to be created to support these business models and conceptualize the digital transformation journey around the creation of these platforms. We have also evolved a 16 point technology framework that needs to be adopted to create these platforms and how technologies like micro-services, cloud, AI, ML, platform engineering can be applied to the creation of these platforms.

Change of the business model is inevitable. Gartner predicts 49% of the organizations will shift their business models for effective ways to capture, create and deliver value. CEOs who will lead these changes have a greater chance of adapting to the new business paradigm and lead a successful digital enterprise.

Every enterprise must adopt a digital platform strategy to stay relevant and differentiated to their customers. Gartner in its article Every Organization Needs a Digital Platform Strategy makes a point that the digital platform strategy will vary from company to company. Some companies will develop a platform business model that encompasses providers, consumers and employees to create or exchange goods, services, and social interaction. Others might integrate with other organizations’ digital platforms. Regardless of the setup, the strategy must integrate business and IT needs and establish a collective leadership vision.

How to begin your enterprise digital transformation with Platforms

The key objective of the first step is to set an appropriate digital platform strategy based on the context, need and business objectives of the enterprise. Another correlated step for enterprises is to identify a suitable platform type that can be used as a reference for their envisioned platform. Laying out the platform strategy upfront helps an organization understand the expected value as well as risks of undertaking this journey.

The key objective of the second step in the platform journey is to understand and capture the current state of the organization for its business & technology readiness to initiate digital transformation. Assessment of business and technology readiness assessment helps business leaders to calibrate the current situation better and then helps them to set pragmatic strategies of platform-based digital transformation on the time and resources it takes to reshape technology areas or business areas or both. For example, Sonata’s digital maturity assessment helps the client assess the current state of digital readiness. It is a short assessment that explores the capability and maturity of the enterprise. With help of this assessment, we are able to provide our clients valuable insights about how to go about creating a successful digital platform for their company.

What are the key ingredients to building a successful digital platform?

The key components to building a successful digital platform can be broken down to two major things- Business architecture and Technology architecture.

Business Architecture
The key objective of the third step in the journey is to bring new insights on how the business ecosystem and market works, and what role the business owners and others can play in it. Laying out the business design of the platform helps the business leaders to re-organize or even re-structure business operations, and core interactions amongst the participants of the platforms to achieve its goal of building a connected, intelligent, open and scalable platform.

Technology Architecture
Another key objective of the fourth step in the journey is to assess, evaluate and prioritize implementation of the 16 technology enablers to build connected, intelligent, open and scalable platforms. These 16 technology blocks are a combination that creates a holistic framework for building an ideal technology platform. Striking the right balance with these technology elements becomes extremely important.

16 technology parameters that will define your digital platform strategy

Execution

The key objective of the final step is to select an appropriate realization technique to establish the required team organization with an appropriate structure and skill-set, implement the platform technology framework, and launch the platform. Defining the method of platform realization and laying out the development and execution roadmap by defining the key releases, team, and launch plans help business leaders to align with the organization’s digital platform strategy and goals.

Enterprises can choose a proven industry framework to realize this strategy. Sonata’s Platformation™ is such a proven framework that guides customers in setting up their digital platforms. Platformation is a unique approach to digital that helps enterprise becoming open, scalable, connected and intelligent. It embodies the platform development intricacy with its proven framework that helps enterprise accelerate the digital agenda.

Irrespective of the framework that is chosen, as business ecosystems expand, CIOs will have to manage increasingly complex digital platform architectures. To handle such systems traditional IT strategy will no longer sufficient to meet the business needs. Enterprises have to adopt a digital platform strategy to exponentially grow their business.