Digital Transformation helps firms to target new markets, business models

Many Indian companies have boarded the digital transformation express to cut costs, increase efficiency and expand businesses, and many others are planning to do the same, according to a top official in consulting firm Frost & Sullivan.

"Indian companies are doing it or planning to do that. Under this process, transformation of a company happens internally as well as externally.

While digital transformation helps in cutting costs, increase efficiency, the most important elements are the ability of the company to look at a new market segment, cross-selling and also the retain its customers," Aroop Zutshi, Global President and Managing Partner of Frost & Sullivan, told IANS in an interview.

He said companies implementing digital transformation can also look at new market segments with a new business model that were not addressed earlier for want of technology.

Zutshi is based in the US and is also on the corporate board of Frost & Sullivan Inc. He was in India to attend a conference.

Zutshi said digital transformation is more than the business process re-engineering (BPR) -- a management concept that was popular among the corporates not long ago. According to him, internally the transformation happens in the form of integration of all functional areas and use of data to look at things in a better way.

He said every company in a way would be involved in data analytics to take decisions. On the customer side, during sales process there will be value enhancement in the customer's experience. "Companies have to be one step ahead of customer's expectations," Zutshi added.

Offering a digital experience to the customer, their retention levels will also go up. Zutshi said digital transformation is equally applicable for companies in the manufacturing and services sectors.

Speaking about implementing the digital transformation in a company, Zutshi said it should be the central theme of the organisation. "There may be some initial pain points like loss of jobs," he said.

According to him, the top management should be committed for digital transformation of an organisation to succeed."

As to process of digital transformation of a company, Zutshi said first the company would be scanned in detail to understand it, the market in which it operates, its industry position, what it does to retain customers and other aspects.

After that, the firm would tell what could be done, the outlay it may involve and the return on investments.
"We would also look at new business models and new customer segments the company could target," Zutshi said.

According to him, the outlay for digital transformation depends on the level of automation the company has and other aspects. The cost may range from Rs.50 lakh to even Rs.5 crore on the high end.

Zutshi said there are companies in India that implement digital transformation in phases and also in a full fledged manner.