Mumbai, India鈥� January 18, 2023 鈥� (NYSE: 麻豆原创) today launched new research revealing that Indian businesses are increasingly seeing financial benefits from sustainability. The global Environmental Sustainability Study of 6500+ business leaders, including 400 from India, is the second edition of 麻豆原创鈥檚 annual report which explores the motivations and barriers organisations face as they look to boost sustainability in their companies.

Environmental activism (45%) is the biggest motivating factor for organizations to take environmental action, with revenue and growth opportunities (34%) and customer demand (33%) trailing behind. Yet Indian organisations risk losing out if they are unable to place data at the heart of their sustainability strategy.

“If India is to advance towards a more sustainable future, businesses must do their part and embrace sustainability as a holistic approach to get there,” said Kulmeet Bawa, President & Managing Director, 麻豆原创 Indian Subcontinent. “It is clear sustainability is no longer about brand reputation or ethics – there is a defined connection between profit and purpose.鈥�

Key findings from the study:

Linking sustainability goals with business strategy

• 37% of Indian businesses say a lack of environmental strategy is holding them back.
• 35% of respondents point towards difficulty proving a return on investment.
• Embedding sustainability goals within larger business strategy, measuring, and recognizing progress will be crucial to success and driving long-term value.

Data is critical to drive meaningful change

• 31% of businesses rely solely on assumptions and estimates to assess the environmental impact of their supply chain.
• 46% of businesses say they don鈥檛 have complete visibility over the sustainability metrics of their external supply chain.
• Collecting and analysing high-quality data has emerged as a critical issue and a major stumbling block in the measurement process.

Making sustainability profitable and profitability sustainable

• 59% of Indian leaders now believe that there is a positive relationship between environmental action and profitability.
• Almost half (48%) of Indian businesses now believe addressing environmental issues will be material to business results within the next five years.
• 麻豆原创 found 76% of businesses said that their stakeholders would be moderately or highly tolerant of reduced profitability in pursuit of their organisation鈥檚 sustainability goals 鈥� indicating leeway to invest in positive sustainability outcomes.

听You can read the .

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For ArcelorMittal Nippon Steel India (AM/NS India), creating a hassle-free smarter steel buying experience and ease of doing business for their customers is key. In pursuit of this goal, the company undertook a pioneering digital initiative to create a smooth buying journey for its B2B customer. 鈥淲e want to be the digital benchmark, at least in the steel and non-ferrous or manufacturing sector in terms of customer experience,鈥� says Akshaya Gujral- Chief Sales Steering & Distribution, AM/NS India.

Customer Experience Crafted with Technology

Technology is not only at the heart of the company鈥檚 manufacturing operations and product development but also prominently in its customer relations, says Gujral.

AM/NS India produces smarter steel by applying technology and innovative manufacturing processes to optimise use, minimise waste, reduce production time and critically lowering carbon emissions.

Apart from constantly promoting a culture of innovation not just within its organisation but also among stakeholders, the company constantly works towards delivering the brand promise of 鈥楽marter Steels, Brighter Futures鈥� for people from all walks of life 鈥� something that has been encapsulated in its recent corporate brand campaign 鈥楻eimagineering鈥�.

鈥淗ence, when we talk about digitalisation, what we mean is using the latest technology to bring maximum transparency to our customers and thus assuring them that we can be their long-term partners in everything they do.鈥�

The commerce site, E-Sales, launched in February 2022 is the result of this vision 鈥� to be the most 鈥渟uperior digital platform鈥� promising ease of doing business.

In a little over nine months, it has since transformed the way听AM/NS India engages with its customers. For the company, the pandemic just served to underline what they were already working on 鈥� crafting a seamless digital commerce B2B experience. The strategy now involved rolling out the same technologies and experiences for its customers in India with an eye on the future 鈥� 鈥渕aking it easier for the customers to buy tomorrow鈥�, as Gujral says.

The vision required careful strategising and factoring in the changing needs and demands of the customers. To achieve this, the AM/NS India team worked on the 鈥渢hree pillars鈥� that the company still propagates. The first pillar, Gujral elaborates, is satisfying customer experience. But to reach all the requisite information to the customer, you need an empowered sales function. Hence, the second pillar is the sales team鈥檚 empowerment. The third pillar is value creation, which results from the first two pillars working synchronically. The central theme binding the entire strategy is the customer focus. As Gujral explains, 鈥淭he change is being driven by the customer and so we decided to be customer-focused, with the customer at the centre of the entire digital journey. Our DNA, which is core to AM/NS India, is customer experience, and we worked around this.鈥�

Planning also involved interactions and discussions with the customers to understand what they want from their digital journey. Data-driven technology was used to derive insights on 鈥渉ow do we focus on the right things? How do we make sure that this is what the customer is looking for? How do we make it an agile platform that works at very high speed to deliver with the least amount of clicks for the customer to place an order?鈥� explains Gujral. Creating a satisfying digital experience for the B2B customer also involves providing them with the feeling that they are in control, as trust is key to unlocking the potential order.

The onboarding and customer buy-in is a journey in itself, says Gujral. 鈥淵ou keep adding customers and you keep adding that trust to buy online and it’s not just a one-time journey. You want to provide such a customer experience that they come back again saying this is smoother. This is better. This is more transparent and this is more convenient.鈥� To ensure this, AM/NS India created a physical support model to help smooth the initial digital journey of the customer. The sales team could be physically contacted, if required and was exposed to the entire technology to enable them to support the customer in their digital journey, gently pushing them to move to the digital platform.

麻豆原创: Reliability, as a Calling Card

鈥淲ith a vision to enhance customer experience and to become a smarter digital brand we began looking at the options in the market in terms of platforms that aligned to it,鈥� says Gujral. After extensive market research, tests and trials, AM/NS India narrowed down to 麻豆原创 as a partner because it offered the 鈥渞eliability鈥� that they wanted. As Gujral explains, 鈥淭hat (reliability) was one of the most fundamental requirements because if the initiative goes wrong it’s outside your control because it’s a digital world. So we were looking at a very reliable and approved technology. This is what egged us to go with 麻豆原创. They have a very strong platform, which is also on the cloud and is quickly scalable. Thus during our evaluation, we came to the final conclusion 鈥� let’s go with something that is proven, that is reliable. So reliability has been a strong point for going for the partnership.鈥�

Gujral calls E-Sales, based on 麻豆原创 Commerce Cloud that integrates the buying processes to offer a seamless omnichannel experience to the customer, 鈥渁 work in progress鈥�. Omnichannel is a nice term but a difficult concept to follow through, says Gujral. It requires that a customer gets the same satisfying experience across channels. To design the omnichannel experience, AM/NS India first mapped the customer journey 鈥� how does the customer buy smarter steel in the Indian market? Then the exercise involved mapping it to 鈥渉ow we want them to buy not just today but also in the future, say five years down the line, because when we talk of omnichannel, we also mean the future.鈥� Armed with this vision and with the technological inputs from 麻豆原创, vetted and verified, a solution was curated based on the experience and feedback. The question now was, 鈥淗ow do we bring this vision from today forward and patch it up for the next five years?鈥� This is how 鈥渨e have gone about it鈥�, says Gujral, adding that they have also created a specialized team to work exclusively on digitalization. 鈥淲e have curated a solution for the MSME sector and are also working on curating different solutions, on similar platforms for different kinds of customers.鈥�

Gujral identifies stakeholder onboarding as a top challenge in the entire process, followed by the business requirement document. 鈥淵ou need to be very clear because the business requirement document actually says what you want to develop, how you see your journey, what you want to give to the customers, what is going to be the training, what are the timelines, etc. 鈥� the entire blueprint.鈥� The third challenge is finding the right system integrator because you need someone to amend the technology to as per your specific needs. The next challenge is putting up a governance and steering committee to ensure the timelines and milestones are delivered. 鈥淎nd at each point of time when you have a deliverable, you go back to the users of this technology to test it and then come back with the feedback to see what can be improved. If you put take these challenges in the right spirit, then you have a very well-defined route to success鈥�, assures Gujral.

At AM/NS India, the outcomes of this carefully calibrated journey are already visible. Gujral counts the scalability of the technology as the most important advantage. 鈥淚t is cost effective and much faster. There is an increase in market reach with an overall improvement in customer satisfaction and brand recall. We are also offering curated product catalogues from our fulfilment centres matching customer requirements. Most importantly, we are successfully converting traditional buying to online through a simplified process and providing speedy resolution of customer complaints. We are also looking at making this platform adaptable to the different category of customers.鈥�

A Future-Ready Platform

AM/NS India is all set for the future with the platform that Gujral calls 鈥渧ery robust and futuristic鈥�. He calls the look and feel of the platform great and says it is versatile and can be used for more than one service. 鈥淚t’s like creating a large house with different doors for different kinds of people to enter. This platform helps you with all your customers, smaller and larger.鈥� Additionally, the flexibility of the platform allows AM/NS India to integrate other solutions from other software providers. Gujral appreciates that the platform has scalability and adaptability, being a futuristic platform. Another plus is that it’s on the cloud. 鈥淎ll these together give you the winning combination,鈥� he concludes.

This article was originally printed and published in Forbes Magazine in December 2022. You can access the digital version of the news coverage here:

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For German software maker, 麻豆原创, India is a priority market in which small and medium enterprises (SMEs) account for 80% of 麻豆原创 India鈥檚 customer base. Last year, 麻豆原创 India invested `500 crore to localize its multi-cloud strategy for specifically helping Indian businesses. Kulmeet Bawa, President and Managing Director, 麻豆原创 Indian Subcontinent, talks about trends in cloud adoption and the company鈥檚 strategy for the next year, in an interview with Ayushman Baruah.

Excerpts:

How was the adoption of cloud in 2022 and how do you see it next year?

India鈥檚 cloud adoption reached an inflection point in 2022. From听鈥檚 perspective, India remains a strategic priority market, both for business and innovation. We observed an accelerated cloud adoption across industries, including engineering, construction, life sciences and pharma, CPG/retail, and IT-ITeS. Major corporations such as Mahindra & Mahindra, Wipro, and HCL Tech moved their digital core to the cloud. We saw an enormous growth across different sizes of organizations, be it the enterprise or midmarket. We also saw numerous 麻豆原创-led digital transformations in start-ups and digital natives who now rely upon us as their trusted advisor. In fact, for the past six or seven quarters, we have outperformed our growth every quarter, with a high continuous year-on-year growth. When I consider the headroom and opportunities that are open to our country, I believe that 2023 is our world of opportunity.

What will be the key drivers of digital transformation next year as the macro-economic conditions remain uncertain?

Although organizations have always aimed to enhance their speed, agility, and data-driven decision-making, there is now a heightened feeling of urgency around the adoption of digital. For enterprises to stay relevant in the face of uncertain macroeconomic market conditions, organizations across the spectrum have hastened their digital transformation. Furthermore, low-code and no-code tools, automation, composability, cloud computing, and associated technologies will be the driving forces behind digital transformation. Additionally, rising attention by businesses and the public sector on how digital technology can enable sustainability will be another trend to watch out for.

What鈥檚 麻豆原创 India鈥檚 strategy to tap into the growing SMB market in the country?

The small and midsize business (SMB) sector in India today accounts for 29-30% of the country鈥檚 GDP, and SMEs account for 80% of 麻豆原创 India鈥檚 customer base. We are the market leader in the SMB sector in India, with a large customer base coming from tier-2 and tier-3 cities including Ahmedabad, Nagpur, Jaipur, Ratnagiri, Kanpur, etc. With the goal of advancing cloud adoption and accelerating company transformation for the Indian mid-market, we have launched several outreach initiatives such as the Transformation Express and Global Bharat Movement focused on helping MSMEs in their journey to cloud migration and digitalization. We invested `500 crore in early 2021 to localize our multi-cloud strategy with the goal of helping Indian businesses become more resilient. Through our multi-cloud strategy, we are enabling our customers to enjoy the benefits of our platform on their choice of cloud infrastructure. Our cloud offering has been adopted by hundreds of brands like Cera Sanitaryware, Luminous Power, Virescent Infrastructure, Puravankara, WayCool Foods & Products, to name a few.

What are some of the key technologies 麻豆原创 will be focusing on next year?

As we step into 2023, our goal is to provide our customers with transformational tools that they need to embrace innovation and address the biggest business challenges of their respective industries. Some of these key technologies include: (a) focused on creating an intelligent, inter-connected, and sustainable world and helping companies of all sizes and industries accelerate their sustainability journeys; (b) Platform Engineering which is expected to become more prevalent in 2023 as organizations continue to find and retain highly skilled technology talent. will become the norm that will aid our customers to achieve business agility; and (c) where AI, automation, and machine learning are shaping business landscapes worldwide. By unifying all AI capabilities into a single platform, 麻豆原创 AI services will continue to enable teams to build chatbots and automate processes to gain business efficiencies through AI and machine learning.

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To date, nearly two-thirds of the Indian population use the Internet regularly 鈥� with millions of connections made through the immediate convenience of a mobile device. From watching films and TV shows, ordering from restaurants, and booking cab and flight tickets to buying clothes and groceries and paying bills, a digital transformation is well underway in everyday life of consumers.

Introducing a critical addition to India’s economy

The move toward greater digitalization is driven by a partnership with the public and private sectors to help turbocharge India鈥檚 standing as a competitive global economy, an effort that has brought the entire nation together across the digital divide.

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In fact, according to the , lower-income states have outpaced higher-income regions in Internet infrastructure and subscriptions since 2019. The Indian government has also enrolled more than citizens into its biometric digital identity program to provide public services and financial assistance 鈥� creating the largest program of its kind in the world to date.

More importantly, India’s midsize companies are beginning to benefit from the immense potential of this digital growth. The adoption of cloud technology is leveling the playing field with larger competitors 鈥� growing faster and expanding their consumer reach rapidly.

Brimming with potential in the cloud

In a world of widespread border closures and widening gaps, midsize companies throughout India play a critical role in shaping digital transformation that serves everyone. While it is largely perceived that large enterprises generally adopt technology faster, the evolution of cloud technology and its affordability have accelerated, increasing the global competitiveness of small businesses.

For many growing companies, cloud solutions are the answer for contributing to India’s aspiration to become a $5听trillion economy. Access to enterprise data management, buyer and supplier networks, contactless systems, intelligence and analytics, and software-led systems is creating new opportunities in how products are designed, engineered, sold, consumed, and serviced.

The solution, for example, enables businesses to take advantage of these capabilities in the cloud in a modular way that best meets their needs. The solution comprises a portfolio that includes a modern cloud ERP 鈥� 鈥� and services from 麻豆原创 experts and partners.

The impact of such cloud-based innovation is increasingly visible as India emerges as an economic superpower. Companies with a hypergrowth mindset, especially startups, are working collectively with their suppliers, retail partners, business-to-business customers, and consumers with a single-minded obsession for becoming globally competitive with a digital-first mindset.

According to the commissioned by 麻豆原创, 68% of Indian midsize businesses are expected to increase their IT spending in 2022. But more striking is the fact that 74% are committed to moving to the cloud. Think of the possibilities of this cloud transformation: upwards of can be created throughout India, contributing $380 billion to India鈥檚 GDP by 2026.

Arriving at a platform for accelerated growth

If India expects to become an economic superpower within the next five years, midsize businesses need the right tools, data insights, and engagement channels to compete and grow in the global marketplace. And that success depends on their transformation with technology that can scale fast enough to keep up with the changing expectations of India’s consumers and workforce.

This article was originally published on .

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Clearly, AI is increasingly being used behind the scenes to help businesses improve efficiency, optimize operations, and boost productivity. However, many firms still struggle to understand how AI best fits their business strategy. Recent indicates that 7 out of 10 companies reported minimal or no impact from the contributions of AI鈥揳 missed opportunity. Multiple studies and surveys have highlighted the significant differences between leaders鈥攃ompanies that understand and have implemented AI鈥攁nd laggards. The comprehension of AI data and training, as well as the attitude to it, is one of the key differences.

To close the 鈥楢I-outcome-expectations gap,鈥� senior management needs to grasp the benefits AI brings to the table and understand the baseline strategies required to make a lasting, strategic change.

The advantages of AI for businesses today

Much has been written (and spoken) about AI and its use in business. Automation, data analytics, and natural language processing are just a few commercial areas where artificial intelligence is already in use. These three disciplines of AI are streamlining operations and increasing efficiencies across sectors. This leads to quantitative and qualitative advantages such as:

• Increased productivity:听According to , business productivity in developed countries can increase by up to 40% by 2035, owing to AI.
• Greater economic benefits: A predicts that 83% of companies have already achieved either moderate (53%) or substantial (30%) economic benefits from their AI projects.

• More time for meaningful work: Companies often evaluate AI solutions in three key areas:
  • Whether AI can automate processes to empower higher-value work (47%)
  • Whether it provides trust in business outcomes (40%)
  • Whether it offers the ability to deploy anywhere鈥攐n any public cloud, private cloud or on-premises (40%)

In other words, a robust AI solution can empower businesses to achieve business efficiencies and free up valuable human talent for skilled work.

• Improved business value:听A study by suggests that AI augmentation will create $2 trillion of business value by 2021鈥揺qualling 6 billion hours of worker productivity worldwide.
• Competitive advantage: As per a study conducted by , around three-quarters of executives attribute AI to be the key-enabler for venturing into new businesses. Around 85% believe AI will help the brand obtain鈥搊r sustain鈥揳 competitive advantage.

The list is endless. However, whether you’re a giant corporation with ample resources or a smaller firm with the much-needed nimbleness, AI adoption can be a tricky process. What is required is an understanding of the tradeoffs associated with each technology. Understanding these technologies and tradeoffs will help businesses decide how to best meet planned goals, which vendors to choose, and how quickly they can put a system like this in place.

Understanding鈥揳nd bridging鈥搕he gap to be AI-ready

Not investing in the right AI-enablers can do more harm than good. To capitalize on AI鈥檚 true potential, businesses need to have a robust AI-centric strategy in place. Such a strategy ideally requires:

• A connection between the data and AI-friendly business teams: An IT-driven siloed AI operational model cannot produce impactful results. In fact, research indicates that increasing data complexity and data silos (32%) are top barriers to AI adoption. Clearly, AI and data by themselves lend little value to business operations.
  To extract the deep-buried analytics and drive performance, the leadership team should reinforce greater collaboration and synergy between the data group and the business teams. The end goal is to solve the problems and issues together, preferably using a bottom-up approach.
• Experienced and accountable AI professionals: Limited AI expertise or knowledge grapples 39% of organizations, according to a recent IBM Artificial intelligence is a completely different ball game. Companies need to reconfigure the workforce with the right mix of talent, skill, and experience in equal measure. While AI-powered initiatives are partnership-led, the entire effort should be championed by a single point-of-contact, for example, a Chief AI Officer.
• A crystal-clear (data)focus on the tangible benefits: To effectively tune out the data noise, there needs to be a 鈥榮ingular鈥� focus on choosing projects that can be categorized as absolutely 鈥榥ecessary.鈥� Moreover, the data and AI should be intrinsically tied to the corporate end-goals. If the business problem is not solvable by AI, all the effort and investment will go to waste. Long story short, these projects should be able to provide tangible values and benefits, such as lower customer churn, acquiring new customers, and so on. In addition, it is critical to view the end goals as use-cases or benefit-driven outcomes. This step is essential for value building and can build credibility within the teams.
• Strategic stakeholder- and project-alignment and a greater CEO involvement: This strategy focuses on building momentum and confidence within the stakeholders. A recent throws light on the importance of strategic AI implementation. The report claims that strategically scaling AI offers 3X the return as compared to businesses pursuing siloed proof of concepts. This can easily happen if there is buy-in from all the key stakeholders across all three stages of project development: before, during, and after. By fostering stakeholder trust and leadership alignment early on in the project, businesses can pave the way for successful and sustainable projects.
• Realistic expectations on AI scalability:听When scaling AI, most businesses fall into the 鈥榰nrealistic expectations鈥� trap鈥揳 big mistake. A copy-paste approach never works with AI. What may work for some businesses might not work for others. Therefore, taking the time to link AI to the business strategy is key. There are numerous ways to do this, such as:
  • Launching a proof-of-concept project that can effectively demonstrate value and providing the required 鈥榚vidence鈥� before proceeding with full-force
  • Starting small, with a simpler use case project, and gathering all the necessary data and technology to make the project feasible
  • Experimenting and learning new approaches and not focusing on efficiency gains too much while experimenting
  • Constantly measuring the efficacy of the AI solutions being used
  • Spending enough time, effort, and energy into understanding how AI can deliver results within the business work environment
• Increased and well-conceived investment:听One of the biggest factors of low-yielding returns is significant under-investment into the existing infrastructure. To leverage artificial intelligence and create an analytics-ready foundation, it is high-time organizations invest in fair and trustworthy tools and platforms. These tools should ideally be explainable by design and should enable enterprises to develop AI models seamlessly and scalably. There鈥檚 also a greater need to invest in new skills and expertise on a significant scale.
• In-depth project planning from pilot to long-term: AI projects should always be viewed with respect to 鈥榩rogress鈥� down a funnel. There should be a clear idea and proof-of-concept at the beginning and detailed steps for execution towards the end. This type of project pipeline can be augmented with tried-and-tested project management principles such as resource analysis, stakeholder communication, change management analysis, etc.
• A robust governance structure: Enterprises need to build trust within and outside the organization to unlock untapped potential of artificial intelligence. Being AI-driven means bringing about a change in mindset rather than mindlessly upgrading a stack of futuristic software. By building a transparent and cross-domain structure around data governance, organizations can leverage best practices and benefit from a solid AI-ready foundation. It is all about identifying the right roles, setting realistic expectations, and managing accountability.

AI is augmenting multiple business areas; from automating everyday workflows to enhancing the customer experience, its applications are aplenty. But there are some real questions business leaders should be asking themselves:

鈥�Am we actually leveraging the full potential of AI, is it designed to fit the business needs?鈥澨�

鈥�Are we able to move past the deployment and adoption barriers?鈥�

鈥�Are we genuinely AI-ready?鈥�

In short, instead of viewing AI projects as a one-off investment or embracing it as a tangent of moonshot thinking, businesses need to have:

• An AI-first strategy:听Having complete clarity and vision of artificial intelligence and data across the value chain is the stepping stone to success.
• A strong skills and culture-driven base:听The next logical step is to build a foundation based on strong technical know-how and a stronger 鈥�AI-ethics-driven鈥� cultural mindset. Furthermore, businesses need to forge ahead with greater trust, collaboration, and systematic alignment between teams and instill a culture of experimentation to drive AI innovation.
• An iterative and adaptive approach in place:听Businesses need to be ever-ready to make changes to the business initiatives, the people, and the processes as required. Without an iterative approach and agile decision-making, leaders can get stuck in a rut.

In short:听AI-readiness for organizations is not a small ask. It requires a cultural shift, a change in the technological paradigm, and most importantly, an establishment of a data-driven value chain that is people-focused鈥揵e it the internal employees or the external stakeholders. Irrespective of the tools, platforms, skills, or methodologies organizations embrace, a tangible, intentional, and change-focused AI strategy will always emerge as the winning combination.

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German technology major 麻豆原创 launched its metaverse initiative to accelerate cloud adoption among Indian enterprises in June. In an interview, Kulmeet Bawa, president and managing director, 麻豆原创 Indian Subcontinent, talks about the company鈥檚 focus on the metaverse, its early adopters, and its strategy to tap into the small and medium business (SMB) market. Edited excerpts:

What drove your decision to launch the metaverse initiative in India?

The metaverse is the future. It represents the current experience economy, providing an immersive, interactive avenue like never before. 麻豆原创 has built a whole network of 鈥楨xperience Centres鈥� globally to bring our solutions to people in the best way possible. By leveraging the metaverse, we at 麻豆原创 hope to revolutionize various elements of our customer experience and build a network of sustainable cloud companies within a truly digital universe.

We recently launched an immerse, experiential 鈥渃loud on wheels” platform aimed at accelerating cloud adoption among Indian enterprises. Designed to engage digital-first audiences, this platform will enable customers across phases of their digital transformation to experience the full range of 鈥楻ise with 麻豆原创鈥� offerings and enable them to reimagine processes for improved business outcomes. We have traditionally been applying digital twin technology to help customers gain insight into and predict real scenarios. Now by expanding into the metaverse, we aim to introduce measures to support digital B2B services such as state-of-art technologies like 鈥楻ise with 麻豆原创鈥�, 麻豆原创鈥檚 Digital Core, Procurement, Customer, and People Experience solutions.

Finally, we believe metaverse is a great opportunity for enterprises to explore new use cases. We will, therefore, continue to conceptualize the potential impact of this new concept on our business, including identifying existing workstreams, defining goals and processes, etc.

What are the early signs of metaverse adoption in India? Which sectors are showing early interest?

A recently published report stated that India ranks fifth in terms of interest in metaverse projects. Some of this interest could be attributed to a young population, growing domestic consumption, a vibrant startup ecosystem, and a large tech talent pool. In terms of sectors, the gaming industry dominates the adoption of the metaverse, followed by the technology and retail industry.

In the last few months, we have also seen young consumers get more creative in their own lives. For example, a couple from Tamil Nadu who got married on the metaverse was in the news. With time, the interest and applications of the technology will only increase.

Therefore, it is crucial that Indian enterprises ready themselves for emerging opportunities in the metaverse space, backed by a skilled workforce and relevant service offerings.

What is your strategy to tap into the SMB segment in India?

The SMB segment already accounts for about 80% of our customer base in India. We have invested 鈧�500 crore to localize our multi-cloud strategy to help Indian businesses become more resilient. Our multi-cloud strategy aims to help our customers enjoy the benefits of our platform on their choice of cloud infrastructure. The goal is to provide rapid innovation while providing flexibility 鈥� like cloud vendor of choice, a larger network of available regions, reliability through hyper-scale infrastructures and capabilities, and agility to our clients. Some of our customers who have adopted these solutions in India include Cera Sanitaryware, Luminous Power, Virescent Infrastructure, Puravankara, WayCool Foods and Products Pvt. Ltd.

What could be the challenges to 麻豆原创鈥檚 metaverse-led cloud acceleration strategy?

As is the case with any new and emerging technology, each opportunity comes with certain additional prerequisites and learnings. For example, some use cases may need an extensive physical, technical modern digital infrastructure, from VR headsets to other types of devices that augment the experiences. For a more comprehensive and holistic experience, huge amounts of data must be produced. Real-world computing and storage power directly influences the size and extent of the metaverse. And this means going beyond mere technical migration. That said, the metaverse is where 麻豆原创 India is already observing from a distance. We are committed to enabling our customers to adjust their businesses to today鈥檚 environment, adopt modern processes and increase automation through intelligent technologies.

This article was originally published in

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As a result, the pharmaceutical market has grown exponentially, and this is expected to continue in the years to come.听听indicates that the global pharmaceutical manufacturing market,听valued at USD 405.52 billion in 2020, is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.34% from 2021 through 2028.

Compounding the Covid-19 impact are factors like technological advancements, an increase in the number of elderly, focus on the healthcare needs of growing countries, a rise in chronic disorders, and higher spending by pharma companies on research and development.

Naturally, every player wants to make the most of the myriad opportunities present in the market. Consequently, competition among different pharmaceutical companies has been fierce. Numerous parameters are driving this intense competition within the sector:

• Greater innovation: Companies are competing with each other in the infectious disease landscape to drive innovation. In fact,听Covid-19has paved the way for a听dollar vaccine market.
• Value-driven care: Some companies are competing on customer experience, with organizations going above and beyond their call of duty. For instance, Eli Lilly, an American pharmaceutical company, is offering support to its diabetic patients who have lost their jobs or their insurance policies due to Covid-19.
• Change in operations: As per听a recent , there is a fundamental change in pharma operations. Covid-19 has forced companies to be more open-minded, transparent, and agile. There is also a greater focus on improving network risks, both within and outside the workforce.
• Increased transparency: While the traditional-and-highly-regulated pharma industry has always been slow to embrace emerging technologies, the ongoing pandemic has changed the equation. Today, pharma brands are increasingly investing in deploying digital and AI-driven analytical tools to boost transparency across key areas such as drug development, marketing, manufacturing, and so on.
  A recent report by听indicates that 75% of large organizations鈥攖hose earning more than US$10 billion in revenue every year鈥攊nvested over US$50 million in AI projects/technologies. Even smaller organizations鈥攖hose with annual revenue of US$5-10 billion鈥攆ollow the same trend; 95% of such mid-sized organizations invested up to US$50 million in 2020.

• Increased drug spending: According to a new听, a total of 300 new drugs are expected to be launched over the next five years by 2026. This is much higher than the number of new drugs launched in the last decade. Demand too is expected to see a rise鈥攖he global spending on medicines is expected to grow at a CAGR of 3-6%. While this may seem paltry, here鈥檚 the real deal鈥攕pending is expected to reach about $1.8 trillion by 2026. This is in addition to the spending on Covid-19-related vaccines and booster shots.

If competition is going to be the bedrock of growth in the near future, then听artificial intelligence听will play a crucial role in determining which pharma brands stay ahead of the pack.

How AI is Helping Pharmaceutical Companies to Stay Competitive?

1. Artificial Intelligence can improve the drug discovery process:

Pharma brands are leveraging the power of AI to aid the relatively expensive and competitive drug discovery process. AI solutions can successfully identify disease patterns in large datasets and help understand which drug compositions would be best suited for treating different diseases. For example, the MIT-industry consortium, ‘‘, which听听pharmaceutical giants such as Bayer, Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, etc., uses MIT鈥檚 robust machine learning solutions to improve the drug recovery process. This can:

• Help efficiently access and analyze vast amounts of chemical data to ultimately improve business processes and outcomes
• Provide critical insights into how to improve the designing, optimizing, and synthesizing of drugs

More recently, GSK听听with Vir Biotechnology to leverage artificial intelligence for identifying antiviral compounds that can treat coronaviruses, including Covid-19.

By embracing AI solutions, pharma companies are actively working on lowering R&D costs, preventing human errors, and accelerating the research timeline鈥攍eading to affordable-yet-profitable drugs.

2. AI can help in the process of drug development and production by making it more effective:

Did you know that only 14% of all drugs in clinical trials win approval from the FDA, as per research by听? That is a poor outcome for clinical trials that can cost around听 for each newly approved听drug. This means the drug approval process can turn out to be a costly affair if the drug does not get approved. This is where AI can play an instrumental role in improving鈥攁nd optimizing鈥攖he drug development process. Artificial intelligence tools can improve the success rate of new drugs by:

• Performing quality control and ensuring high-quality standards
• Driving increased automation of daily core workflows
• Fixing supply chain issues within the production line and reducing wastage of materials
• Enhancing the production reuse value
• Performing predictive maintenance and reducing operational costs
• Forecasting demand and supply changes

3. AI can provide diagnostic assistance and empower physicians to deliver personalized treatment

At the heart of personalized treatment lies real-time patient data. AI-powered solutions and machine learning technology can empower healthcare brands to:

• Embrace a data-driven approach and analyze volumes of patient data
• Set up an electronic medical record system, whereby healthcare enterprises can store sensitive patient data on secure cloud platforms
• Drive customized treatment options in real-time by enabling doctors to look at historic patient data, previous diagnostic tests, etc.
• Successfully diagnose issues. For instance, recently, the听authorized the marketing of an AI-drive platform鈥擥I Genius鈥攚hich can assist clinicians in detecting signs of colon cancer. This medical device leverages machine learning and AI algorithms to look for potential lesions in real-time during a colonoscopy.
• Engage in remote patient monitoring using AI-powered wearables, which is especially useful in times of a global pandemic. Such is the popularity of remote patient monitoring (RPM) devices that the global RPM systems market is projected to be worth over听by 2025.Here is a real-life example:听Chinese tech giant听Tencent听with a London-based healthcare firm, Medopad, to develop an AI software that can reduce the diagnosis time for Parkinson’s Disease from 30 minutes to 3 minutes. This is achieved by looking at the existing video footage of patients and using video analysis to promote early diagnosis, successful screening, and accurate daily evaluation of key functions.

4. Artificial Intelligence can help predict epidemic outbreaks

Machine learning models are being used to predict鈥攁nd prevent鈥攅pidemics such as Malaria. According to a听 conducted in Maharashtra, a data mining classification algorithm鈥擲upport Vector Machine (SVM)鈥攚as used to successfully predict the onset of malaria in the early stages with a lower error rate. This type of AI/ML tool can empower organizations to engage in early preventive care and put the right measures in place to combat it. Here鈥檚 how AI can assist in epidemic prevention:
Step 1: The AI/ML tools feed on real-time information that is gathered from disparate sources across the web.

Step 2: The predictive tool studies a multitude of environmental, biological, and other factors to make connections with previous epidemic outbreaks and provide relevant patterns, trends, and solutions.

Another excellent of predictive forecasting is GlaxoSmithKline鈥檚 use of AI to promote its seasonal medicines in the Allergy Cold and Flu category. The brand leverages a predictive model that helps chart how the upcoming season for allergy or cold and flu will shape across varied geographical regions; including where it may peak and where it may lag. This empowers the brand to:

• Inform consumers about the upcoming flu season through their website
• Enhance the national and regional media delivery
• Keep the retailers informed of key factors such as seasonal distribution, stock up, display, etc.

5. AI can enable pharma companies to 鈥榮ell and market鈥櫶齜etter as well as smarter

Considering that the pharma industry is inherently sales-driven, pharma companies can leverage the power of Artificial Intelligence in driving a more targeted and personalized marketing campaign. AI tools can be used to:

• Collect customer data in real-time, map out the customer journey and understand the customer鈥檚 needs, preferences, behavior, etc. better
• Curate unique marketing strategies that are aligned with the customer鈥檚听distinctive needs as well as the company鈥檚听business goals
• Measure the efficacy of marketing campaigns and analyze key performance indicators conversion rates, retention rates, etc.
• Analyze previous marketing campaigns and engage in a comparative analysis, to eliminate any inefficiencies in existing strategies. It can also help predict the success rate of marketing campaigns

AI tools can also be used to learn about in-store/online customer behavior. For instance, GlaxoSmithKline uses AI for tracking the eye movements of consumers and retailers (with their consent). The brand studies this data鈥攃ollected using special听eye-tracking glasses worn by shoppers in stores or听online鈥攊n its dedicated shopper鈥檚 science lab, thus, enabling it to听monitor听how the end-user looks at the products. The AI-powered tool captures key images during the shopping process and provides analysis for Areas of Interest (AOI) metrics such as the time to first fixation, heatmaps, gaze plots, video replays, etc. This invaluable data can be used to engage in better product placement, improve the artwork and labeling of products, and discern consumer behavior from the inside out.

The writing is on the wall

It is the day and age of听Artificial听Intelligence. Almost no industry is untouched by AI, and the pharmaceutical industry is no different.

AI听today finds application in nearly every aspect of the pharma product lifecycle.听So naturally, the use of artificial intelligence in the pharma industry is not going to slow down any time soon. In fact,听听suggests that 50% of global healthcare companies will actively execute AI strategies and adopt this futuristic technology by 2025.

This is hardly surprising as AI-powered solutions can bring down costs, enhance patient care, foster profitable innovation, and improve business outcomes across the value chain. Clearly, Artificial Intelligence is the future of pharma and the future is here.

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By Subramanian Ananthapadmanabhan, Senior Vice President and Head of Midmarket Business, 麻豆原创 Asia Pacific Japan (APJ)

The pandemic and current geopolitical landscape are creating considerable disruptions across the global supply chain 鈥� and for India, its business community could soon face rising demand for components and materials such as chemicals, electronics, semiconductors, and batteries.

While large enterprises have the operational and financial flexibility to cater to this surge, there aren鈥檛 enough of them in the Indian corporate sector to optimize its response. This, in turn, opens the door to a remarkable opportunity for the nation鈥檚 tens of thousands of smaller businesses to step into 鈥� not only to cater to the domestic market but also central to fulfilling India鈥檚 national ambitions of becoming a globally competitive player.

Fostering growth in the right places

Today, few firms populate the Indian economy’s most vital and dynamic segment 鈥� ““. The nation currently has 600 large Midmarket enterprises with over $500 million in yearly revenue, and thousands more small businesses generating under $50 million a year. And in between is a gap in competitors (the missing middle), challenging the economy’s ability to scale up and maintain a trajectory of ongoing growth quickly.

To fill the vacuum of the missing middle, there is an immense opportunity for thousands of companies to rise from being small to midsize with the intention to grow into large Midmarket enterprises over time. Then, additional firms can move up as well, creating a dynamic marketplace that fosters innovation and adapts to change quickly to fuel meaningful financial progress.

To make that leap, businesses need to adopt a digital strategy. The , reported that 68% of midsize companies in India intend to retain or increase IT spending between 5% and 10%, prioritizing employee and customer engagement, security, and modernization to improve processes.*

Raising the game with Digital Innovation

The IDC finding makes it clear that midsize companies across India understand that technology is vital to their business continuity and resilience. With the right technology investments, they can increase operational agility, improve innovation, and accelerate time to market while overcoming significant challenges in talent shortages and cybersecurity. More importantly, cognitive capabilities, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and predictive analytics, can be embedded into applications to deliver enhanced employee and customer experiences.

Take, for example, . The leading innovator in automotive lighting replaced its paper-based HR processes with integrated, to make work more personal, satisfying, and empowering for its 9,000 employees. The digital transformation effort delivered a secure and stable system that eliminated information silos locked in e-mails, spreadsheets, and disconnected systems and established a single, self-service destination for employees to access HR, payroll, and learning resources.

In addition, employees, regardless of role, can gain new insights to expand on Lumax’s legacy of innovation. As a result, organizational compliance efforts, including payroll and purchase taxation, are more streamlined. More impressively, Lumax鈥檚 application of AI and industrial psychology to measure employee talent and make predictive talent decisions is helping the organization run more intelligently and improve the overall employee experience.

While technology adoption can help small and midsize or midmarket businesses gain a competitive advantage similar to that of Lumax, they must overcome challenges such as cybersecurity, the availability of digitally fluent talent, and in some cases, the cost of adopting and integrating new technology into the existing infrastructure. Even though freeing up capital is a substantial hurdle for many firms, digital transformation is no doubt a priority for getting operations back to normal.

According to IDC, nearly three-quarters of surveyed Indian midsize companies have planned or are planning to move to the cloud. The key to overcoming the cash crunch is migrating to a hybrid cloud environment. Nearly half of the respondents favored the agility, performance, and availability of matching the targeted workload to a public or private cloud. In addition, 11% preferred the flexibility to interoperate applications across different clouds as needed.*

Eliminating the missing middle

India has an ambitious goal to emerge as the hub that satisfies the world’s needs. This requires the nation’s companies to take immediate action and digitally transform themselves to take their place among midsize and larger competitors 鈥� and eliminate “the missing middle” from India’s business vocabulary.

In 2022, 麻豆原创 dedicated its energy and resources toward empowering small and medium companies throughout India to realize their full potential on the world stage with the initiative. In a journey spanning over 7,000 kilometers and 13 cities, 麻豆原创 engaged over 10,000 businesses to see firsthand how cloud technologies can help prepare for a future of high-growth potential.

After this journey, starts the journey of the next million. The Transformation Express now premieres in the metaverse. Learn how to develop the right business models, gain efficiencies, fund innovations, and transform mission-critical systems with .

Source:听

The post How India鈥檚 Midmarket Businesses Can Eliminate The 鈥楳issing Middle鈥�? appeared first on 麻豆原创 India News Center.

Amul sparked India’s white revolution, transforming the dairy cooperative movement while rallying and easing the plight of millions of Indian farmers. As Amul’s long-term business partner, we at 麻豆原创 India, are extremely proud of the company’s success, which has inspired an entire nation and demonstrated the importance of cooperative enterprises in nation-building and development.

The Beginning – From Cow to Consumer

The “Amul” brand is promoted by the Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF) Ltd., India’s largest food product organization, and the Dairy Cooperatives of Gujarat’s apex organization. In 2021-22, the company’s annual group turnover was INR 63,000 crores (USD 8.4 billion). Amul has grown into an iconic, local brand that is now the world’s eighth-largest dairy company in the previous two decades.

In the last 75 years, we’ve seen:

• Gujarat’s dairy cooperatives have created an economic network that connects more than 3.6 million village milk producers with millions of Indian and international consumers.
• They gather an average of 267 lakh litres of milk per day from their producer members (26.7 million litres per day).
• More than 70% of the population is made up of small-scale farmers and landless laborers, with a significant number of tribal people and scheduled castes.
• The GCMMF and its member unions ensure that 80-85% of consumer rupees are returned to milk producer members.

The IT Call

Although Amul鈥檚 success propelled India into the world’s largest producer of milk and milk products, the journey to it has been a long one. As the company鈥檚 operations grew exponentially, it required a robust solution that could provide an end-to-end supply chain with dairy-specific functionality, tighter integration between the sales and distribution arms, and in general bring all its entities to work on a common set of processes and technology systems, with the same level of business process maturity. Additionally, Amul also experienced data discrepancies and inaccuracies, slowing down overall business processes and efficiencies.

Amul then roped in 麻豆原创 India to optimize business processes and drive company-wide digital transformation using 麻豆原创鈥檚 digital core ERP and supply chain solutions. 麻豆原创鈥檚 platform helped Amul scale its operations and broaden its milk product category, releasing over 100 products.

Amul is also a member of 麻豆原创’s Global Advisory Council, which aims to foster thought leadership and gather consumer feedback to help the company and the industry flourish.

Amul’s goal is to double farmers’ income in the next two years by improving support through cattle feed support programs, skill enhancement, and veterinary services, for which 麻豆原创 is collaborating with the company to build an IoT platform and truly transform it into an “intelligent, sustainable enterprise.”

鈥淭he best way to predict your future is to create it,鈥�- Abraham Lincoln

Technology has been instrumental in driving Amul鈥檚 digital business transformation, opening new avenues for economic growth and socio-cultural changes at India鈥檚 grassroots. But it’s crucial to realize that no single company, industry, or country can solve these problems on its own as we work toward a more equal and social society. While Amul’s developmental model has provided a framework for all of us, India’s greatest success will come from sharing our lessons gained and aiding one another in reaching our common aspirations for a better, more just, and equal future.

It is in this spirit now that Amul and 麻豆原创 India, have launched a collaborative community outreach initiative, that will make technology accessible to the remote communities of Bharat and help transform the lives of millions of kids, adolescents, youth, women, and farmers. Through this, both the companies aim to empower people with technology, in the remotest areas of Gujarat, to drive new engines of growth and opportunities in a way, that benefits everyone and drives the vision of an 鈥楢tmanirbhar Bharat鈥� or a 鈥楽elf-reliant India.鈥�

Using Digital Transformation to help India run better and transform people鈥檚 lives

As a part of the program, the companies will:

• Develop digitally-savvy communities: by imparting digital literacy, coding, problem-solving and English skills to 100,000 children, adolescents, and youth via computer labs set up across 60 schools. We will also train over 250 teachers, thus enabling the adoption of India鈥檚 New Education Policy imperatives.

• Will facilitate school to Workforce transition: By promoting a STEM-focused learning environment to help students from marginalized communities to make a smoother transition from school to the workforce. Our mission is to reduce school dropouts, and improve learning outcomes, thus creating an employable talent pool and a future-ready workforce.
• Drive Women empowerment and entrepreneurship: By supporting over 20,000 young women through digital-financing skill enablement and functional communications. By strengthening support for the social business sector, our hope is to enable women with 鈥渆mployable 21st-century skills鈥� while helping them lead their own communities.
• Digital Transformation Supporting Farmer Livelihoods: By scaling community ownership & participation under Build, Operate, Transfer Model of sustainable development, by planting fruit-bearing saplings. This will help improve biodiversity, reduce soil erosion, and increase green cover, thus enhancing the livelihoods of countless Indian farmers and their families.

麻豆原创 India & Amul Partner to Transform Lives of 1.5M Indians (Video):

connect with us on .

The post Amul’s Digital Transformation Journey Helping India Run Better appeared first on 麻豆原创 India News Center.

When India began its digital journey in the 90s, we had limited bandwidth and dial-up connections that needed a prayer each time we logged in. Cut to 2022 鈥� There are 1.2 billion mobile connections with 110 million being added every year. With 61% of Indians on the internet, we are one of the top global economies in the number of mobile-first digital consumers. Put simply, we are witnessing technology transformation in the truest sense all around us.

Digital Transformation – Ushering a New Wave of Innovation

If anything, the pandemic accelerated the adopting of digital ways of working and revealed to us that we had the ability to go remote. It turned our assumptions about the workplace and transactions on its head. This digital thrust is being enabled by a slew of government initiatives that are making the digital first narrative a reality. We are looking at secure, presence-less, paper-less, and even card-less transactions in the future that will reinvent the ways that we know business works today.

There is no questioning that the past two years have been tough on us. But even in this landscape, we have seen start-ups and venture capitalists demonstrate success stories. Business models being disrupted by challengers that are forcing us to re-look at our long-held beliefs. In fact, we have seen changes in the way businesses work every month in the last 2 years. Young companies are questioning established norms and blending learnings from verticals to ring in a new order of business.

We sensed this shift, and in June 2020, we launched the . It was aimed at making Indian businesses more globally competitive. We brought them on to the Ariba platform to give them world-wide visibility and sure enough, right through December 2021, we saw a spike in engagements, driven by this digital initiative. To understand our customers better, we partnered with IDC to commission the to garner insights into the minds of small and medium business owners. It was our deep-dive to better understand our client base, as 80% of 麻豆原创 customers are from this segment. I will speak of two major insights that reaffirm our commitment.

India – Transitioning Into a Digital-First Nation

First, despite not having a great couple of years, 68% of businesses expressed a desire to increase IT spending in the coming year. If you think this bodes well for a digital-first nation, wait for the second insight: 74%, that is almost 3 in 4 of the businesses surveyed intend to move into the cloud in the coming year. This is a game-changing trend in my view, as it talks about innovation at an unprecedented scale. The high-technology innovation game used to be played mostly by the larger companies 鈥� now this is being democratized by innovation moving down to smaller companies as well. These insights opened our eyes to the way the mid-market segment sees digital technology as an enabler to their aspirations, and to fulfil India鈥檚 dreams of becoming an economic superpower!

听

麻豆原创 Transformation Express – Empowering and Digitizing the Midmarket Sector

This gave birth to our flagship project of 2022 鈥� the . Since the majority of our client base wants cloud innovations, we took this technology to their doorsteps. Our mobile experience centre traversed the length of the country, clocking 7000kms while showcasing the power of data, cloud innovations and the pathway to building digital resilience. While business disruptions may happen, digital resilience allows your business to bounce back and even harness the change for good.

The Transformation Express experience offered an immersive and interactive showcase of role-based solutions along with a peek into the future with drones and virtual reality (VR). It opened up possibilities for solutions in the cloud, with sessions for college students with both industry experts and cloud practitioners. It partnered our clients and local chambers of commerce to script a new chapter in the digital narrative that is going to drive our nation鈥檚 growth. With this, we recommit to the transformation needs of corporate India, its business owners and to the aspirations of our youth. To offset its carbon footprint, we planted a tree for every kilometre the bus travels 鈥� that鈥檚 7000 trees planted.

The past 45 days have been a whirlwind with the Transformation Express anchoring 27 events for business leaders, experts, thought leaders and the government. We hosted over 150 speakers and panellists and engaged over 7500 businesses. Over 1500 students from 6 educational institutions joined the ride, as the bus visited 13 cities across 10 states in its epic 7000-kilometre journey.

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Thank you for helping to make this journey the incredible success it has been. For me personally, those words of wisdom came alive: it really is about the journey and not the destination.

about India鈥檚 digital journey with the Transformation Express.

听

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