Over the last one year, technology has emerged as the cornerstone of business leadership. As companies shift from reacting to the crisis to reinventing themselves, those who use technology innovation to shape the new realities will come out as winners,” says Piyush N Singh, lead – India Market Unit & lead – Growth and Strategic Client Relationships, Asia Pacific and Latam, Accenture. “To build greater resilience, enterprises must open themselves to more digitally led partnerships, invest strategically and think beyond traditional industry boundaries to function like digital natives.”
Prioritising technology innovation in response to a rapidly changing world has never been more important. One of the key learnings from this massive world health crisis is that those who use technology to master change will define the future, says the 21st annual report from Accenture predicting the key technology trends that will shape businesses and industries over the next three years.
According to the Accenture Technology Vision 2021, technology was a lifeline during the global pandemic enabling new ways of working and doing business, creating new interactions and experiences, and improving health and safety. “The global pandemic pushed a giant fast-forward button to the future. Many organisations stepped up to use technology in extraordinary ways to keep their businesses and communities running—at a pace they thought previously impossible—while others faced the stark reality of their shortcomings, lacking the digital foundation needed to rapidly pivot,” said Paul Daugherty, group chief executive – technology and chief technology officer at Accenture. “We now have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to turn this moment of truth for technology into a moment of trust— embracing the power of exponential technology change to completely reimagine and rebuild the future of business and human experience.”
Accenture surveyed more than 6,200 business and technology leaders for the Technology Vision report, and 92% report that their organisation is innovating with an urgency and call to action this year. And 91% of executives agree capturing tomorrow’s market will require their organisation to define it. The Technology Vision identifies five key trends that companies will need to address over the next three years to accelerate and master change in all parts of their business:
Stack strategically: Eighty-nine percent of executives believe that their organisation’s ability to generate business value will increasingly be based on the limitations and opportunities of their technology architecture;
Digital twins: Sixty-five per cent of executives surveyed expect their organisation’s investment in digital twins to increase over the next three years;
The democratisation of technology: Eighty-eight percent of executives believe technology democratisation is becoming critical in their ability to ignite innovation across their organisation;
Work from anywhere, everywhere: Eighty-one per cent of executives agree that leading organisations in their industry will start shifting from a ‘Bring Your Own Device’ to ‘Bring Your Own Environment’ workforce approach;
Multiparty systems: Ninety per cent of executives surveyed state that multiparty systems will enable their ecosystems to forge a more resilient and adaptable foundation to create new value with their organisation’s partners.