'Asia/Pacific enterprises behind global counterparts in digital maturity'

Asia/Pacific enterprises are slightly behind global counterparts in terms of digital business maturity, with 20 per cent of Asia/Pacific CEOs describing their enterprise as "digital to the core," compared with 22 per cent globally, market research firm Gartner said on Thursday.

According to the Gartner, 45 per cent of Asia/Pacific CEOs think of digital transformation as a way to optimise their current business versus 42 per cent globally.

"CIOs need to take on an evangelizing role with the CEO and other business leaders about the transformative possibilities of digital business using real examples," said Partha Iyengar, Vice President and Gartner Fellow, in a statement.

Asia/Pacific CEOs expect productivity in their organisations to increase by 24 per cent by the end of 2018, with revenue and profitability as the top two metrics of success.

To achieve such aggressive productivity gains, Asia/Pacific CEOs believe that conventional technologies (cloud, ERP, analytics and CRM) will help them, rather than technologies that support digital transformation (digital environments, blockchain, the Internet of Things, robotics, artificial intelligence and 3D printing).

Digital business offers a way for Asia/Pacific firms to lower their cost structure drastically and thereby increase margins, but these firms are not pursuing digital business as aggressively as they could.

--IANS

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