DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION
What does it mean and what will it bring to your business?
Traditional businesses as you have known them for years have been changing to keep up with modern times and trends. More and more is done using technologies, and this changes our needs and expectations. The term ‘digital transformation’ then simply means transforming your business to fit into the modern digital era.
The purpose of digital transformation is to improve and innovate your business model. As a result, you will:
- Lower the operation costs
- Speed up production and improve precision
- Create new products or services
- Improve security and work productivity
- Help you keep up with the competition and create new competitive advantages
- Acquire new customers
- Get the company processes under control
- Attract and maintain high-quality employees
- Gain a deeper understanding of the company’s data
- Simplify and adjust processes throughout the whole company and remove all errors
Customer-driven pressure on prices, quality and speed of delivery as well as on new products and services will only increase due to the dynamic age we live in. Companies that want to retain and strengthen their position on the market basically have no other option than to fundamentally innovate their business, the efficiency of internal processes and the scope of offered products and services.
Innovation of the business model brings new forms of customer satisfaction. In some cases, this is viewed as a matter of fact. Just like we don’t need to go to a bank in person, we expect easier shopping thanks to e-shops and configurators even from traditional businesses and service providers.
Just like mobile devices always offer new applications and services that used to come as special products (e.g., cameras), traditional businesses have to also consider how to upgrade their current products and what new functions and services to add (e.g., data collection for optimum operation and maintenance of devices).
PHASES OF THE DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION PROCESS
Phase 1
Digitalization of processes across the whole business
Phase 2
Replication of physical flows into a digital form (digital twin)
Phase 3
Innovation of the company’s business or operation model
Benefits of moving to the next phase:
80 % of data processing today consists of entering, searching, and processing of data, while only 20 % is using these data for optimization of processes. The second phase turns this ratio around, and hence there will be less administration and more solutions.
Automated data collection speeds up the reaction time for requests, minimizes errors, allows the measurement and improvement of the efficiency/productivity of individual activities, and saves money. The discussion and solution of problems will be done using specific data and will therefore remove speculations about “what, who, when and how someone was supposed to do something”; there will be a record with a reference to a specific person for all key activities.
This phase will also allow the use of simulations to see what would happen, if...