In Focus

Anshuman Tiwari

Global Head of Delivery Excellence
DXC Technology

A process-excellence lens could enable businesses to get better every day and come back faster in the game.

Globally, the last few months have been tough for most of the organizations and their employees. During the lockdown, people’s movements were limited by various governments, and many were confined to their homes. Even though the stay-at-home guidelines are no longer active, many people are still apprehensive about venturing out. Age-old habits and operating models are getting changed because of measures such as social distancing that are in place to contain the spread of the crisis.

Today, enterprises are faced with the task to navigate the business challenges in the wake of the crisis and stay put in the market marred with subdued economic sentiments.

Technology and business leaders are in search for the best ways to address issues such as sluggish customer demand, changing behavioral patterns of consumers, and raw material supply challenges.

One such way is to accelerate the adoption of digital technologies, amidst a rising focus on reimagining the business models and adopting a multi-pronged approach.

In a recent interaction with Jatinder Singh of Better World, Anshuman Tiwari, Global Head of Delivery Excellence, DXC Technology, elucidates the critical role of process excellence services in helping enterprises fast-track their digital transformation journey, improve customer experiences, and achieve better returns on investment.

Excerpts of the interview:

Better World: As economies try to get back to normal, many businesses are gasping for survival. In such a scenario, how critical is the role of process improvement to outsmart the uncertainty?

Anshuman Tiwari: Before we go into the criticality of process excellence for the industry, let’s take a step backward and examine how continuous improvement works out in our daily lives.  For over six months, we have been living with stay-at-home guidelines. Many habits and operating models have been transformed because of social distancing measures that are in place to contain the spread of the crisis. We call it the new normal where businesses are often functioning by enabling every part of their process digitally.

Despite disruption during the lockdown, most of us were able to receive essential services such as groceries, milk, and fruits, mainly because of a set of processes. There may have been delays or interruptions initially, but digital services helped us collaborate and get all the necessities delivered at our doorsteps. This success is a prime example of process refinement or process excellence. Processes are nothing but a set of activities repeated multiple times for an excellent outcome. So, the process techniques are essentially developed to operate better every week and every month, leveraging whatever opportunity we get from time to time.

Processes are integral to every industry and even more to an IT industry where most customers are global and have already been exposed to robust techniques. Moreover, in the IT industry, margins are always under pressure, and end-users want to get the same thing at a cheaper cost. However, one cannot compromise with quality to reduce the cost. It would be best to discover a way to operate efficiently to save costs. Process excellence techniques such as Lean, Six Sigma, and automation come handy to enable businesses to improve cash flows without impacting the customer experience.

The current economic environment has compelled organizations to revisit their business models and include the digitization aspect in every part of their business. Enhancing processes is a critical aspect of digital transformation. Due to slow market demand and wafer-thin margins, organizations require massive efforts to strengthen their operations, improve supply chains, and reach out to their customers in new ways.

There have been growing technological advances in helping enterprises automate specific parts of their operations. An in-depth process lens can enable businesses to get better every day. It allows companies to break down and analyze processes that can be automated to deliver the same or better quality at a lesser cost. For instance, process improvement techniques can help an organization to take the robotic process automation (RPA) route to accomplish the same job with fewer people.

Across industries, efforts are being made to eliminate inadequacies and deliver exceptional services to clients.

Better World: You mentioned that process excellence is a stepping stone to digital transformation. Could you please elaborate how these two are correlated?

Anshuman Tiwari: I would like to answer this question in two parts. First, digital transformation is a fancy name. Many organizations have already stopped using the word digital transformation because they feel that every organizational shift is in some or the other way connected with digital technologies. Digital transformation is all about bringing new and advanced technologies to help you perform better, faster, and more effectively. Second, it’s not a new concept; technological change is happening all the time. For instance, fifteen to twenty years ago, we were not ready for full-scale web conferencing. Most of the collaboration tools were still emerging or were primarily limited to text chat. Internet speed was limited. Today, we are getting high-quality education and medical consulting through various web meeting and conferencing tools.

Thus, you are bringing technologies to improve a process, which is resulting in rendering the earlier process primitive. The erstwhile snail mail or even telegram services, for example, may look archaic to various instant communication services such as WhatsApp.

Anshuman Tiwari

Global Head of Delivery Excellence, DXC Technology

Anshuman is a process transformation professional with experience across multiple industries, including banking, professional services, information technology, manufacturing, and consulting. He specializes in setting up and scaling world-class operations excellence programs. In the last few years, he has also managed large RPA and digital initiatives.

Before DXC Technology, he had worked for global multinationals such as EY, HSBC, and Infosys. He is also a fellow member of American Society for Quality (ASQ), formerly the American Society for Quality Control, a knowledge-based global community of quality professionals.

Besides work, Anshuman is a fitness fanatic and has participated in several marathons across India.

Top skills

  • Process improvement
  • Digital transformation initiatives
  • Six Sigma, Lean, automation, robotics process automation (RPA) and maturity frameworks
  • Agile project management

Education

  • Post Graduate Diploma in Management (MBA) in Operations Management, K.J. Somaiya Institute Of Management Studies and Research
  • B.E. Industrial Engineering, Nagpur University

Now, let’s understand how a process or service excellence enables organizations to drive continuous change. It is imperative to know what we want to improve and why we wish to invest in making that improvement? Is it service delivery, resource optimization, customer experience, or all three? Any process enhancement may involve some investment or technology implementation. However, for any organization or entity, financial resources are limited. Process excellence teams help businesses determine the problem, suggest a solution, and showcase how the solution will help. Through process enhancement initiatives, organizations identify an opportunity and attain the final state of operational excellence through continuous improvement. This entire effort makes a process more effective and intelligent to deliver positive outcomes consistently, with minimal waste.

While there may be several ways to transform operations digitally, process testing can help accomplish which method is best and more suited to achieve a definitive outcome. Many transformation journeys end in suboptimal benefits, i.e., they don’t give the results they promise. That’s why you need a ‘method’ to transformation. Process excellence efforts give you a holistic outlook for your transformation efforts.

Better World: How do you engage with different business leaders for a service-excellence initiative? What are some of the best practices that you adhere to while proposing a given solution?

Anshuman Tiwari: There are two parts of the spectrum. On one end, nobody wants to improve. Some leaders wish for a status quo. They don’t desire to change or iterate a set of technological processes for getting satisfactory results. On the other extreme, some executives look to continuously change everything. Both approaches are detrimental.

If you don’t want to change and respond to the transitions happening around you, you will not grow or begin losing market share. Many erstwhile leaders failed because they did not respond to market needs or transformed their products and processes to improve their market positions. In the end, it resulted in their ruin.

On the other side of the spectrum, there are executives who wish to change everything all the time. It can be very costly and confusing for people. By the time people get to know about the new process, it would have already got changed. The probabilities are high that in such a condition, there will be a lot of unhappy employees and dissatisfied customers.

Then some people and executives who are in the middle of the spectrum. I believe that most of them are either in this category or are slowly moving toward it. There is a growing awareness around the worth of testing different processes that can impact the end customer. But it would be best if you demonstrate the inefficiency and merits of enhancing a process.

Let me give you an example. A few years ago, in an insurance process review meeting in Hong Kong, we discovered that one of our insurance-sector clients was taking one to two weeks in delivering an insurance policy. In that market, we found several other leading insurance players were taking a maximum of one week in issuing insurance policies. We examined their case and gave them an overview of how this delay could hamper their prospects. They were initially reluctant to accept, but when we explicated that their process was broken and had too much inefficiency compared to three other banks and insurance providers, they bought our idea and immediately sanctioned the process enhancement project.

So, even if your processes are working all right but failing to give you market competitive results, it’s time to evaluate. It may happen that your customers do not see it because of your past success or goodwill, but you should invest in it for long-term market advantage to scale down your error rates. Continuous improvement of a process improves not only the lives of employees but also customers. On top of that, organizations get the benefits of cost savings. You would not want to utilize the efficiency of your quality employees by giving them a task to reconcile and match data. This kind of job can be performed with the help of some software programs quite quickly.

So, in a nutshell, evaluating a process is critical to ensure that a company performs well. And all process-efficiency projects are either related to customer benefits or your people’s benefits or both.

Better World: Given the growing focus of enterprises on digital transformation, how do you see the year 2021 evolving from a process-excellence lens?

Anshuman Tiwari: Nobody knows for how long the current situation will last. The impact of the current crisis is likely to be felt for a long time, according to many experts. If there is any evidence, the last similar event (Spanish flu) occurred in 1918, which was more than a hundred years ago. It lasted for three to five years in different geographies. Of course, the situation is different in that the medical science has progressed and there are various forms of connectivity today. However, it is also true that there were no large cities back then, and population density was not that high. So, while there has been progress on some fronts, there also are counterbalancing factors that tend to neutralize those improvements. Today, we are transforming and changing fast due to this sudden disruption. Like every other practice, process excellence will also change. Priorities for large businesses will be very different for some time. Enterprises will look for rebuilding businesses. There will be a strategic focus on renewing processes in such a way that companies can come back faster.

While it is difficult to predict things, given the unprecedented nature of change, I believe there will be a reasonable investment in technologies such as RPA and internet of things (IoT). Customer centricity will continue to push organizations to innovate and develop new products and services. That’s where most of the processes will be built.

Organizations that follow a smart approach to transformation by leveraging their people, diverse processes, and technologies will be way ahead. Like any other area, process excellence will need to adapt to newer developments and focus on innovation so that as the opportunities arise, we can take advantage of those.

MORE FROM BETTER WORLD

Chandresh Dedhia, Head – IT, Ascent Health

Chandresh Dedhia, Head – IT, Ascent Health

In Focus

Chandresh Dedhia

Head of Information Technology
Ascent Health

There is a strong emphasis on touchless behavior and hence on AI-based touchless technologies.

As the COVID-19 pandemic has persisted, businesses have responded with due precautionary measures, while making a swift transition from the traditional physical work environment to an virtual work ecosystem as much as possible. For a majority of enterprises, the remote-working model was implemented almost overnight and turned out to be a massive experiment during the first phase of lockdown. 

In India, the work-from-home (WFH), was earlier mostly limited to privileged users. However, the pandemic introduced a significant and extraordinary change. Now, many companies have extended the complete WFH policy for their employees until June 2021. Today, all eyes are on the technology leaders who have assumed an enormous responsibility to devise and execute a differentiated tech strategy to embrace this new normal as part of a process.

In a recent interaction with Jatinder Singh of Better World, Chandresh Dedhia, Head of Information Technology, Ascent Health, outlines the top technology trends and challenges that the businesses are facing in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic. He also shares some of the best practices and technology implementations that could lead enterprises to deliver an exceptional customer experience with minimal disruption. Excerpts.

On the new normal and learnings
In today’s highly fluid situation, the business and IT landscapes are becoming more and more complex. Traditional models and architectures have lost their sheen. The longer the pandemic stays, the stronger the chances are that we will not go back to the pre-COVID normal. The last few months have helped us learn and unlearn many things, and these learnings will pave the way for the new model. Things have changed, people have transformed, and mindsets have changed. There is an indelible impact on almost everyone.

Moreover, because of the new operational dynamics, organizations have altered their policies. They are now focusing more on innovation and agility. Digital transformation is high on the agenda. The current crisis has given a growing sense of belief and visibility to enterprises on the best ways to tackle any future disruptions.

On technology trends and business order post COVID-19
I feel that there is a natural push towards the implementation of new-age technologies such as machine learning, artificial intelligence, business analytics, and robotic process automation (RPA). Until now, the adoption was happening at an unhurried pace. Now, digital transformation is no longer an option but a competitive advantage. The new normal is here to stay for a very long time, and no organization will like to be stuck because of its traditional ways of working. Enterprises have understood that they will need to explore ideas and means to ensure that the business continuity remains intact. Of course, given the fact that businesses have managed to stay afloat in the last four months, most of them are well equipped to plan their working models for the future.

There is a strong emphasis on contactless behavior, and this is likely to remain in place for an unspecified time. The pandemic has compelled us to keep focusing on social distancing, and hence enterprises will have stringent policies around contactless behaviors. Much focus will be on AI-based touchless and remote monitoring technologies implementation. So, the traditional model of working will be replaced by new working ways. Technologies like video and web-conferencing will continue to witness tremendous traction.

It is also expected that most of the organizations will invest a significant amount in multiple cloud environments to keep disruption at bay. The hybrid cloud model is likely to gain substantial traction businesses across sectors.

Going forward, companies will evaluate if they can save costs by reducing real-estate, and heavily relying on the new-age technologies for scaling-up. Technology is a great enabler, and ultimately all these benefits will be passed on to the employees. Organization can enhance the existing CCTV setups to accommodate social distancing, face masks, and hand gloves algorithms.

On balancing the short-term revenue requirements against long-term technology investment: 
It is natural for any organization to rationalize its investments. We are no exception either. Every technology investment is being seen in the long-term horizon of, say, three to five years. Anything less than that is technically not a tech investment. For instance, there might be days when manufacturing costs may outweigh any tech-implementation decision. However, that doesn’t mean that the company won’t invest in the required technology. Yes, at times, you’ve to face such tests, but tech investments always have their significance, and decisions are taken based on the value that the technology provides. For instance, let’s say an organization needs to invest in a face-scanning or a retina-based attendance system. Probably before the pandemic, there was no urgency to implement this technology. But in the current environment, everyone understands the long-term benefits of such contactless technologies.

On challenges related to security threats
Remote working has become a new reality, and in a way, the new normal. The COVID-19 pandemic has created a concept of work from anywhere. Not just thousands but lakhs of people have shifted to WFH almost instantaneously. Hackers are always game to take advantage of such unparalleled situations. And for enterprises, it has become challenging to monitor and analyze the behaviors of employees who are accessing corporate data and networks remotely. Much focus will soon be on combining detection tools with machine-based cyber threat intelligence. Organizations will strengthen their capabilities to monitor behaviors and applications accessed by employees. Enterprises will continue to revisit their security policies and solutions to reduce risks to IT infrastructure. It is the need of the hour for businesses to consistently evaluate their readiness for supporting remote working as they scale up. There will be growing pressure on implementing a very sophisticated information security policy. Even SMEs will move away from free security tools and focus on robust and advanced information security solutions.

Chandresh is an IT business transformation leader with experience in digital, IT infrastructure, enterprise applications, information security, and IT governance and compliance. He has won numerous awards for his wide-ranging work in the domains of IT infrastructure and security.

An eloquent speaker and writer, Chandresh is also a marathon runner, environmentalist, and fundraiser. He has been associated with the Umeed Foundation for last three years and has raised more than Rs 6 lakh for education of needy children.

Expertise

  • Warehouse management and automation
  • Data virtualization on Denodo
  • Robotic process automation (RPA)
  • Software-defined WAN (SDWAN)
  • Mobile application development (Low Code)
  • Information security management
  • Cloud-based services on Amazon AWS and Google GCP
  • Enterprise applications and integrations
  • ERP implementation and support
  • B2B application support
  • DevOps and data engineering

Education

  • Global CIO Programme, Digital Innovation, Indian School of Business
  • MBA in Business Management, Marketing and Related Services from ITM and Southern New Hampshire University
Crypsis buy will augment Palo Alto’s AI-driven offerings

Crypsis buy will augment Palo Alto’s AI-driven offerings

Global cyber security major Palo Alto Networks has signed a deal to acquire The Crypsis Group, a consulting firm that operates in incident response, risk management, and digital forensics. Palo Alto will pay $265 million in cash for the purchase. The acquisition process is likely to finish during the quarter ending 31 October 2020.

Palo Alto Networks already has the capability to provides prevention, detection, and response capabilities through Cortex XDR, its ambitious artificial intelligence (AI)-based cyber security solution that natively integrates network, endpoint, and cloud data. Launched in 2019, XDR is an open-standard solution that harnesses technologies such as AI and machine learning (ML) to rapidly detect and respond to threats across an enterprise and its network.

Post Crypsis acquisition, Palo Alto plans to incorporate the Crypsis Group’s processes and technology into Cortex XDR. This integration will help Palo Alto strengthen its security consulting and forensics capabilities to collect rich security telemetry and to analyze, manage breaches, and initiate rapid response actions.

“The proposed acquisition of The Crypsis Group will significantly enhance our position as the cybersecurity partner of choice while expanding our capabilities and strengthening our Cortex strategy. By joining forces, we will be able to help customers not only predict and prevent cyberattacks but also mitigate the impact of any breach they may face,” said Nikesh Arora, chairman and CEO of Palo Alto Networks in a company statement.

The Crypsis Group boasts of managing some of the most complex and significant cyber security incidents and manages over 1,300 security engagements every year, serving organizations across the healthcare, financial services, retail, e-commerce, and energy. As part of the agreement, post-acquisition, all of Crypsis Group employees and the CEO, Bret Padres, will join Palo Alto Networks.

Big opportunity

The COVID-19 pandemic has put enterprises under severe stress, and they are continuously redefining their business continuity plans for enabling their remote workforce to deliver exceptional results for clients. In such a scenario, their IT assets, cloud systems, departmental servers, and data centers have become all the more critical. (See: What it takes to secure IT in the COVID-19 era)

With a remote working environment becoming the new normal, there has been a growing risk for businesses to face new and advanced threats while they focus on agility and manage the scale. (See: Combating threats in the new normal)

“As threat actors continue to professionalize and grow in sophistication, the risk of revenue and the reputational impact of a security breach increases dramatically. To focus on the health and growth of their business, organizations need trusted partners to not only quickly and efficiently respond to and contain attacks but also leverage their learning and insight to prevent future attacks,” said Palo Alto in its release mentioning the Crypsis Group buy.

The current uncertain environment has given cybercriminals a lucrative opportunity to invent novel attacks for data theft. Given the fact that enterprises have accelerated their digital transformation plans and all operations are expected to move into a virtual environment, businesses cannot afford to take risks and are hence expected to invest massively in cyber security solutions in the next few years.

IT security players like Palo Alto are making full use of this opportunity and fast-tracking their capabilities to capture a significant share in the growing market. Since its debut in 2005, the company has expanded its horizons significantly and is offering a diverse set of solutions such as next-generation firewall, endpoint protection, and malware prevention to enterprises. Its acquisition spree in the last two years includes CloudGenix for $420 million in March 2020; micro-segmentation company Aporeto in December 2019; and cloud security companies PureSec (June 2019) and Twistlock (July 2019).

Driven by the work-from-home requirements, Palo Alto reported robust fourth-quarter 2020 financial results. Palo Alto’s non-GAAP net income for the period was $144.9 million, with revenue growth of 18% year-on-year at $950.4 million.

Palo Alto competitors in the market include FireEye, Fortinet, Check Point Software, CrowdStrike, Juniper Networks, and Cisco, among others.

Tech majors extend work-from-home to keep pandemic at bay

Tech majors extend work-from-home to keep pandemic at bay

Cloud software major Salesforce has joined the list of companies who’ve extended their work-from-home policies. Salesforce has announced an extension until July 31, 2021. Top technology companies such as Google and Facebook have already extended their work-from-home policies for employees till mid-2021. Other tech majors, such as Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft, have announced remote working until January 2021.

“Over the past few months, we have been working diligently to support our employees as they navigate this difficult time. The safety of our employees and communities remains paramount. And while we continue to work on plans to re-open our offices safely, the timing of when we bring employees back will be unique to each office — and we will continue to make those decisions in a way that’s consistent with local government guidelines and the advice of our medical experts and local leadership team,” said Brent Hyder, Chief People Officer of Salesforce in the company’s blog.

The San Francisco headquartered tech-major has also announced to give an additional $250 financial support to each of its employees for buying office supplies. The company had provided similar assistance to its employees earlier this year as well. Earlier this month, consulting major EY had also announced similar financial support of US$200 to each of its employees.

Besides, Salesforce employees who are parents will be entitled to take six additional weeks of paid leave. “In all situations where schools have been closed, and students are learning remotely, parents and guardians will be allowed to work from home, even if that date extends beyond our offices re-opening,” Hyder added.

The last six months have been challenging for a majority of companies and leaders. The uncertainty brought in by the COVID-19 pandemic has made it extremely hard for both employees and employers to focus on work solely. People are dealing with issues such as social distancing, remote working, job-loss, elderly care, and ambiguity around almost everything.

As such, enterprises are finding several ways to motivate their talent and prevent burnout. Financial assistance, work-flexibility, and paid leave are some of the measures that companies are offering to support and attract employees.

The new normal is here to stay

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the majority of the companies would offer work-from-home to a very particular set of people on a rotational basis. At that time, In India, the remote-working model was mostly viewed as pointless, with much suspicion from employers. Companies were reluctant to experiment, and employees too were not attuned to an entirely virtual work-environment. However, things changed in a short time. The pandemic has suddenly pushed people to transform their behaviors and compelled them to adopt the new normal quickly.

See also Work-from-home even after Covid-19?

Most of the enterprises and employees have successfully navigated this transition and are looking forward to remote ways of working even after the pandemic subsides. For employers, the new normal is a significant opportunity to save substantial real-estate costs and translate the cost benefits to their employees. For employees, it’s a way to be more productive by reducing travel time while staying connected with their families.

According to a recent study, Technology and the Evolving World of Work by Lenovo, the majority of those surveyed (72 percent) confirmed a shift in their daily work dynamic in the last three months. Employees feel more connected and more productive than ever before as they work from home, but the data shows financial, physical, and emotional downsides for the global workforce.

There is no doubt that the experience of the physical work environment is vital to develop strong teaming and diverse skillsets and hence cannot be completely evaded. To balance that, companies could be mulling to rotate days or weeks of in-office presence for their employees in future, especially in the services sectors.

Can OnwardMobility make Blackberry bloom again?

Can OnwardMobility make Blackberry bloom again?

After a massive downslide in the last decade, the erstwhile dominant enterprise smartphone maker is eyeing an ambitious comeback in 2021. Will Blackberry bloom again?

The enterprise smartphone maker has collaborated with OnwardMobility, a US-based company in the mobile security space, and Taiwanese multinational electronics contract manufacturer Foxconn to design and develop a new 5G Blackberry Android smartphone with a physical keyboard. According to an announcement by OnwardMobility, BlackBerry has given OnwardMobility the right to create, engineer, and bring to market a BlackBerry 5G mobile device. The new phone is likely to arrive in the first half of 2021.

“BlackBerry is thrilled OnwardMobility will deliver a BlackBerry 5G smartphone device with a physical keyboard leveraging our high standards of trust and security synonymous with our brand. We are excited that customers will experience the enterprise and government level security and mobile productivity the new BlackBerry 5G smartphone will offer,” said John Chen, Executive Chairman and CEO, BlackBerry in a statement released to analysts and media.

John Chen, who is widely credited as having earlier saved Sybase from the verge of a bankruptcy, was brought at the helm in 2013 and has since then stayed put.

See: CEO John Chen has pressed the BlackBerry restart button, actually!

Also read: With selloff shelved, BlackBerry hinges even more by Watsa

Return of the Motion?

The iconic Canadian smartphone maker once ruled the mobile market, with over 50% of the US and 20% of the global smartphone market share. However, it started losing the grip after the arrival of the iPhone4 in 2010 and its inability to foresee the rapid shifts in the market and the reluctance to transform swiftly. Today, the company is struggling with a share of less than 0.5% of the total smartphone market.

One of the biggest letdowns for Blackberry enterprise users was the company’s failure to develop a robust app store like Android and iOS. Besides, a delayed approach in introducing modern-day features such as dual camera and dual SIM also paved the way for its accelerated collapse.

In 2016, when Blackberry finally lost all hopes to reclaim its market share, it decided to move away from designing smartphones and awarded the development contract to TCL Communication. The not-so-fruitful association with TCL came to an end early this year, and the new covenant has now been given to OnwardMobility. The last flagship Android-based Blackberry phone launched by TCL was KEY2 LE, which received a lackluster response from the market. It would be interesting to see if OnwardMobility can make Blackberry bloom again.

Banking on the new normal

Due to the recent COVID-19 situation, a significant part of the population is working from home today. This trend is likely to remain in place even after the pandemic subsides. Most of the enterprise technology leaders are beefing up their network security architectures to support end customers and employees efficiently.

Despite losing its numero uno position in the enterprise mobility market, Blackberry continues to attract a specific set of users because of its classy physical keyboard and focused approach on privacy and security. As such, the new normal can present a unique opportunity for Blackberry to explore a wild-card entry in the smartphone market.

“With the increasing number of employees working remotely with critical data and applications, coupled with the constant threat of cyberattacks, there is an absolute need for a secure, feature-rich 5G-ready phone that enhances productivity. Employees are demanding better workplace technology experiences, and organizations are facing increasingly complex challenges in selecting, deploying, securing, and managing devices to meet expectations and maximize employee productivity,” says the joint statement from Blackberry and Onwardmobility.

The announcement may be surprising for many industry onlookers who wrote the obituaries for Blackberry Mobiles early this year after the termination of Blackberry-TCL collaboration. The move, however, is pleasing for the loyal Blackberry enterprise customers who have trusted its capabilities time and again.

“Enterprise professionals are eager to secure 5G devices that enable productivity without sacrificing user experience. BlackBerry smartphones are known for protecting communications, privacy, and data. This is an incredible opportunity for OnwardMobility to bring next-generation 5G devices to market with the backing of BlackBerry and FIH Mobile,” adds Peter Franklin, CEO of OnwardMobility.

It would be interesting to see if Franklin’s confidence can  translate into a renaissance for Blackberry in the post-COVID world.

For other articles related to telecom/smartphones, click here.

Facebook entices creators as it eyes the online events market

Facebook entices creators as it eyes the online events market

Social media conglomerate, Facebook, has recently launched a new paid event feature that will enable Facebook page owners and event managers to create, set up, and collect payments for virtual events. While there are many platforms available to host online business events today, Facebook’s new feature is a first of its kind, which is completely free and doesn’t charge a commission, at least for now. Better World is of the view that with this launch, Facebook entices creators in a very emphatic way.

“With social distancing mandates still in place, many businesses and creators are bringing their events and services online to connect with existing customers and reach new ones,” said Facebook in a blog statement.

“By combining marketing, payment and live video, paid online events meet the end-to-end needs of businesses. Pages can host events on Facebook Live to reach broad audiences, and we’re testing paid events with Messenger Rooms for more personal and interactive gatherings,” it added.

The feature comes free to all web and android users. iOS users, however, will have to pay a 30% app store tax as part of Apple’s tax policy. All apps on Apple’s platform have to use its payment system for the in-app payments and required to pay 30 percent tax for the same.

“We asked Apple to reduce its 30% App Store tax or allow us to offer Facebook Pay so we could absorb all costs for businesses struggling during COVID-19. Unfortunately, they dismissed both our requests and SMBs will only be paid 70% of their hard-earned revenue,” Facebook clarified in the blog post.

A tactical strategy

Facebook says users in 20 countries, including India, will be able to take advantage of this new paid event feature initially. What makes this announcement exciting is that businesses and professionals can launch, promote, accept payments, and build their user base through a single Facebook page. Event promotions can be done online by targeting specific users on the Facebook platform itself, who can pay and watch the event online.

This means that all kinds of events, from Yoga and dance classes to insightful knowledge sessions, can be hosted on Facebook for free.

Facebook is tactically marketing this new initiative as SMB-focused. The company is well aware that SMBs are the growth engines in many developing and emerging economies. By offering an exclusive and highly specialized service, it can create a vast market for itself in the post-COVID work environment. Simultaneously, by providing the services for free, it will be able to test the waters with less noise.

“In our most recent State of Small Business Report with OECD and World Bank, we found that access to cash continues to be the most common ongoing challenge for SMBs. Only 19% of surveyed businesses were getting any financial help (down from earlier in a pandemic). Many businesses are struggling, and every cent matters. Shifting in-person events to online is costly enough that companies shouldn’t have to worry about fees charged by platforms,” Facebook said.

Early this year, Facebook had also announced the launch of Facebook Shops. This initiative was to enable businesses to display and sell their products directly to Facebook users across its ecosystem, including Instagram. (See: Facebook Shops shake-up marketplaces)

A low-hanging events opportunity

The online events industry has suddenly become more lucrative due to a burst in demand, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 scenario. With work-from-home and physical distancing measures likely to remain in place for an unspecified time, businesses will continue to focus on digital avenues for meetings, conferences, and customer interactions.

Tech giants like Google and Microsoft, among others, are already putting more research and development efforts to enrich their solutions and increase their share of a lucrative online events market with good upside potential. Various studies pegged the current market size of online events at around $100 billion, slated for a five-fold increase in the next six to eight years.

Facebook, with its vast network and community of over 2.7 billion users, stands a unique chance to create a niche in the online events space. Additionally, Facebook’s Oculus division, which it acquired in March 2014 for US$2.3 billion, specializes in virtual reality hardware and software products. In future, the social giant could very much leverage the Oculus base for creating an ecosystem around virtual-reality conferences, aka events 2.0.

Tech M to use AI-based upskilling to build a ‘Fit for Future’ workforce

Tech M to use AI-based upskilling to build a ‘Fit for Future’ workforce

Tech Mahindra, a leading provider of digital transformation, consulting, and business re-engineering services and solutions, said it would leverage artificial intelligence (AI)-based learning platform to create a ‘Fit for Future’ workforce. The initiative aims to accelerate new-age skill development for over 60,000 employees globally.

Powered by New Age Delivery (NAD), this upskilling-as-a-service (UaaS) program is aimed at enhancing employee competencies across emerging technologies like 5G, cloud, big data, and robotic process automation. The learning platform leverages AI to provide interactive, on-demand, contextual, and hyper-personalized upskilling to employees in self-service mode to make them fit for future. UaaS enables employees to access world-class content and assessments from across 30+ partners along with cloud-based practice platforms and deployment avenues. The platform empowers employees for seamless transition to digital jobs. The platform is also helping Tech Mahindra tide over the Covid pandemic by facilitating more learning interventions accelerating skill development as per changing business landscape.

Harshvendra Soin, Global Chief People Officer and Head of Marketing, Tech Mahindra, said, “As a global digital transformation leader, we continue to leverage digital technologies to enhance human experiences and talent development to meet changing business and market requirements. Upskilling as a Service platform is empowering our associates to identify and pursue their career aspirations at a speed of their preference, while also giving the tools to work with renewed passion and confidence to create future-ready workforce ‘today’.”

UaaS deploys Skill Knowledge Unit (SKU), a set of related skills cutting across various roles, aimed at providing holistic learning for employees across multiple technical as well as functional (domain), behavioral, and professional skills, thus grooming well-rounded professionals with entrepreneurial and solution-oriented mindset. The platform further recommends relevant career paths and SKUs to the employees based on their current skillset, time to upskill and opportunities available.

Vaishali Phatak, Head – Technical Learning Services & Global Head of Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) said, “UaaS (upskilling as a service) is enabling our employees to continuously upskill and take charge of their growth and relevance to business throughout their journey with Tech Mahindra. The platform is helping us deliver value to our customers by grooming employees in full stack/ end to end professionals for current projects as well as future assignments. We plan to extend the platform to academia, thereby helping college students become future ready by the time they graduate.”

Tech Mahindra developed this upskilling platform in-house to create an ecosystem for higher scale and speed of skill development and fulfil people supply chain needs of the organization amidst dynamic business environment. As part of its TechMNxt charter, Tech Mahindra is betting big on next gen technologies to solve real business problems of the customers by delivering innovative solutions and services. The organization plan to leverage Upskilling as a Service platform along with aggressive industry-academia partnerships, Fit for Future re-skilling and research programs to develop digital capabilities like AI, IoT, AR/VR, and cloud to create workforce of the future.

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