We recently attended the IT News Africa Innovation Dinner in Sandton, sponsored by Business Connexion and Telkom, which underlined the urgent need for businesses to adopt the Internet of Things.
IT leaders addressed a range of topics including the theme “Internet of Things: Real World Applications.” Each presentation by CIOs underlined how the Internet of Things (IoT) is an enabler of market disruption, like Uber to the traditional taxi industry and Amazon to the retail business.
IoT is not just another industry buzzword – it is here to stay and businesses need to harness it and embrace it.
The Innovation Dinner addressed the many opportunities presented by the evolution of IoT and the challenges ecosystem players needed to prepare for in order to maximise the benefits promised by the Internet of Things. Echoing the sentiments of Apple founder, Steve Jobs, speakers concluded that businesses who do not disrupt themselves by becoming digitized risk being passed over and crowded out of their own traditional market strongholds.
Tony De Sousa, Managing Executive, Solutions Business Telkom, and Matthew Blewett, Chief Investment Officer, Business Connexion, discussed the real world applications of the Internet of Things and how to overcome barriers to IoT adoption in the enterprise. They expressed enthusiasm for the great business benefits of harnessing the power of the Internet of Things while also being honest about the IT challenges for CIOs to restructure their processes to take full advantage of the IoT.
Valter Adao, Lead Director and Innovation Leader, Deloitte Digital, made a very key comment that organizations need to understand, and embrace the emerging exponential and disruptive technologies they face, helping them move beyond potential disruption towards creating new opportunities for relevance, growth and expansion.
Here at SYSPRO we are also beginning to harness the IoT and analytics to better service our customers and help optimize their businesses. We are using machine learning and business intelligence to mine the gold in our data-loaded society and use customer behavior patterns and trends to predict future behavior. This includes how we can use historical data to optimize inventory and storage and boost profit margins.
We are embracing the IoT for the benefit of all our customers. Watch as our IoT for ERP adoption journey continues into 2016.
