Leveraging Open Source for Digital Transformation of Enterprise
Organizations have to constantly change and tailor their business strategy to meet the changing needs of internal and external customers. However, in recent years, they have not been prepared to take advantage of the digital paradigm that has enveloped and embraced every aspect of the customer lifecycle. The explosive growth of e-commerce, mobile and social media has completely altered the customer’s lifestyle and buying habits. Companies looking to ride the wave of digital transformation need to have a digital strategy in place in order to make the most out of their digital investments. It is equally important to have a sound understanding of the digital lifecycle and identify business processes which would benefit by going digital.
Modern day businesses face two fundamental challenges – reducing costs and growing revenues. Juxtapose this with the tremendous tech disruptions; what we get as a result are more robust, meaningful, and proven ways of doing business. These include –
- Better systems of engagement
- Better systems of experience
- Better systems of insights
Most of the action is happening in the pure play Open Source segment, as they offer an immediate TCO reduction at multiple levels. Widespread adoption has helped open source technologies become more scalable, adaptable, and affordable.
In India, Open Source adoption is denoted by some interesting trends, insights and statistics–
- 90% of companies will use Open Source for mission critical applications including big names like Reliance
- The benefits of Open Source are immense when it comes to flexibility, cost, and control
- Large insurance corporations have already gained by migrating legacy systems to Open Source, thus savings millions of dollars.
Some key factors that have helped in large scale OS adoption include
- High performance
- Quality
- Lock in freedom
- Ease of deployment and integration with existing systems
- Cost reduction
- Highly secure applications and solutions
What is Digital Transformation?
While the definition varies from one expert to another, we at CIGNEX Datamatics have tried to make a simpler definition of digital transformation – “Bringing content, insights and experience together to generate value”.
Over the last five years, the onset of technologies like social, mobile, big data analytics, cloud and more recently internet of things has revolutionized the way consumers identify, decide and consume products and services. The consumer of today increasingly relies on the power of internet and social media to make buying decisions which is now popularly referred as the Zero Moment Of Truth (ZMOT)6 . He/she shops online on e-commerce websites and does so anytime, anywhere leveraging the power of smartphones and tablets. The rise of digital customers has spawned new and exciting digital business models that are disrupting the way products and services are delivered to customers. Entire services and products are being launched, hosted on the cloud and sold through mobile apps on smart phones and tablets. This is in view of the fact that by 2016, mobile app users will surpass the use of internet domain names, making apps the No. 1 way of engaging with brands.
Key Elements of Digital Transformation
- Implementing SaaS based SMAC platforms
- Modernizing Legacy Platforms and Systems
- Simplifying IT Application Landscape
- Standardizing Infrastructure
- Building Analytics capabilities
- Bringing Consumerization of IT (Bringing social/gamification concepts to Enterprise)
- Adopting Agile and Learn Fast Methodology
However, before moving ahead with the transformation, you need to know if your existing systems can embrace the full value of Open Source or if any tweaks are needed. And what better way to do that, than utilize our highly evolved OpeRA™ (Open Source Readiness Assessment solution)? It helps in assessing the health of IT portfolio of an organization through a structured methodology and identifying opportunities for Digital Transformation and TCO reduction through Simplification, Modernization, Standardization.
Take the FREE quick OpeRA™ initial assessment and find out the areas of focus for digital transformation within your organization. You can also test drive Open Source with a Proof of Concept at US$ 5K.
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About the Contributor
An enthusiast writer, passionate about technology.I write mostly on Open Source services and technologies and currently working with CIGNEX Datamatics, an Open Source solutions company, based out of Santa Clara, US. You can contact me on chandni.bhagchandani @ cignex.com.