Digital business  is more than just software

Californian student Aaron Levie started his cloud services business Box 12 years ago. Box now has more than 70,000 customers of which 64% are the 500 biggest companies on the planet.

During the Box World Tour Levie talks, together with visionaries from Google and IBM, about the future of digitalisation. Visions that are interesting for any company.

Mobility
“Mobility is the greatest change of the past 10 years. It is a reality that everyone can work from any location and that every person can use on demand services at any moment suitable to them. That is no longer science fiction, it is now.” according to Aaron Levie. “It is a trend that has completely changed doing business. It is available for any company. Apart from that the cost of storage is so low that everyone can use the cloud for storage. More and more people work via a global company network.”

Digital thinking
“Every company will have to become digital. And companies that are already digital will have to become even more digital” says Levie. “But it´s not that simple. We see many companies that think that digital business is just a layer of software. They think that if you have good internet access and clients can order online they have made the step to digital. What we see is that these companies have not changed. Everything remains the same.”

“Clients, however, are dealing with this new freedom in a completely different way. Netflix is a good example. The success of this company is not because of their cool app. Netflix was born from the idea of offering content to people when they want it in an affordable way. On top of that they have cool unique content which makes it a new personalised business model. All others who have only made the change from lending DVDs to an online model have missed the boat. They continued with their current business model and made it digital.”

New capabilities
“The capabilities we developed during the industrialisation are now under pressure. The time that we produced first and then sold is completely over. But models such as optimisation and work flow control are based on that. If you want to go digital you will have to do this together with your partners because you are as fast as your slowest partner. Every branche will be affected by these new digital companies and platforms which disrupt current industries. Examples such as Netflix, AirBnB and Uber can be found in any industry. It is because these sort of platforms that give clients a new experience which they then expect elsewhere.”

On demand
“The digital business model consists of services on demand. Paying only when using. Everything is for rent and nothing has to be bought. Everything can be used only when we need it. IT used to be a part of the balance sheet with software according to tradition. Other parts such as sales, production and management have their own software solutions geared towards process control.

Now the world is flat. IT will be the thing that makes the organisation grow.

In the near future the organisation will become flat and intelligent software will make the choices before you can make them. In the future technology such as is being used within Google will become available for everyone. Software such as artificial intelligence will find what is relevant for the user.

Cognitive
IBM have been working on this for a long time in project Watson. “Cognitive computing has changed the way employees work, in big and in small companies. One of the reasons is the possibility of direct access to knowledge which is buried deep within the company.” says Christopher C Crummey, global Executive Director of Evangelism and Customer Experience at IBM´s Watson Work Collaboration Services. “Using Cognitive Bots can help new employees during their first days at a company. New employees can use Cognitive Bots to get answers about subjects such as HR processes, IT tools, policies, procedures and get immediate answers.

Artificial intelligence
“We are facing a new computer era. The convergence of working in the cloud, more powerful mobile devices, bots and artificial intelligence can change productivity step by step” says Johann Butting, Head of Sales, EMEA, Slack. “By embracing this technology and use it for simple, daily tasks we can use our brains and creativity to solve difficult problems. The future of work is a universe in which technology offers discrete and personalised support for everyone. We are looking forward to being part of this journey.”