TIME TO ACT: Business transformation needs a Business Cloud

One thing the year 2020 has proved is that no matter where in the world you live or what you do for a living, technology is indispensable in life. It is transformational, exciting, mysterious, omnipresent —all at once. “It has also re-emphasised the need for enterprises to find bold ways to drive business transformation by adopting digitalisation to emerge stronger,” says Kulmeet Bawa, president and MD, SAP Indian Subcontinent.

In a free-wheeling chat with FE, Bawa says this is not just a short-term goal anymore. “There is a need for a holistic experience that can help employees be more efficient and flexible, enabling customers to go digital, and partners to be adaptable,” he emphasises. As uncertainty becomes the norm in the global business community, companies are looking at technology to drive efficiency and transparency across their business networks. So, what holds the key to a resilient and agile 2021?

The answer (again) is cloud, says Bawa, “although with some more context given our learning in this historical year.” He reckons that the real digital transformation deal is when the business processes are holistically automated, integrated and made autonomous. It calls for a platform on which business get a digital edge and can be transformed in the real sense. This, in essence, is Business Cloud, says Bawa. “It takes a business-first approach and is defined directly by the imperatives to become competitively responsive, ruthlessly efficient, and inherently sustainable. It is not just about the IT infrastructure, it’s all about integrated business applications underlying the enterprise processes. It is inherently architected for cloud—making it scalable, elastic, agile, secure, and data-centric,” he says.

Today, companies can choose from a wide variety of cloud deployment options— public, private or hybrid. Bawa says, “What is most important is building your own business case based on the current IT landscape and maturity, business realities, and most importantly, business requirement based on anticipated scale.”

Changing business models
If we look at the past few decades, products and services have revolutionised the way business is done. Think about any business—all the processes from front-office to back-office have undergone transformation—from manual and error-prone to one that’s automated and efficient. Digitalisation has truly disrupted industries, blurred boundaries, and led to new business models.

According to Bawa, business processes have critical dependencies on internal or external factors. Companies rely on their partners to help meet the growing demands and deliver as and when needed. The need of the hour is to offer customised solutions so that companies can provide a personalised experience and run their businesses seamlessly. “This is the time when enterprises need enablers and expertise, this is the time to build networks on a global scale,” he adds.

Leading the revolution
As the world continues to look towards emerging economies such as India to drive the transformation agenda, the role of technology in enabling that growth cannot be understated, says Bawa. For both business as well as the overall governance framework, managing and utilising data is going to be the key driver for the next few years.

The choice for companies who want to thrive in the true sense is quite clear – perform by adapting to the current customer needs or go into oblivion.

According to Bawa, 2021 is not just another new year that beckons us. It’s the beginning of a new decade that will witness the rapidly changing business dynamics. Those serious about keeping or attaining leadership, in the long run, must exhibit the ability to experiment, learn and fail fast, embed innovation in business & IT processes and be ready to pivot business models to be relevant.

“A sustainable cloud strategy will play a pivotal role in helping organisations in their flight to Cloud 9,” he summarises.