2023 trends: Greater focus on speed and scale in technology investments

As 2023 technology strategy planning and implementation are well underway, industry leaders in the retail, manufacturing, insurance, life sciences, and pharmaceutical industries are keeping a close eye on the latest trends in digital transformation and innovation. One of the crucial areas in which to focus your technology investments this year is undoubtedly speed and scale. In the face of global supply chain shortages, an impending recession, and a general sense of uncertainty, the need to prepare for rapid response to business process changes and customer demands is tantamount. While this may seem an overwhelming prospect initially, the COVID-19 pandemic has already accelerated the pace of digital transformation for many companies. The pandemic caused significant stress on the global economy, but it also served as a valuable learning opportunity, and a gateway to sustainable digital transformation initiatives.

Digital transformation is not a one-time event. It’s a journey that, when done right, will lead to long-term growth and prosperity for your business. As climate change, wars, and other potentially significant disruptions to “business as usual” are likely to shape the business landscape now and into the future, forward-looking enterprises need to incorporate speed and scale into their digital transformation strategies for sustainable growth, agility, and competitive advantage.

There’s no question that the rate of digitization has significantly increased over the past few years as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to research conducted by McKinsey, companies allocated 65% more funds toward digital and tech initiatives in 2021 alone. This amount exceeds the funds allocated toward other continuity measures during that year of the pandemic.

Furthermore, as the dire reality of climate change looms, more companies are working to lessen their carbon footprint. While this is a commendable endeavor, it comes with a hefty price tag. McKinsey estimates that ESG initiatives could require $130 trillion in global capital investments by 2030. Major companies now find themselves in a tight spot, tasked with striking a balance between profitability and a sustainable supply chain. However, according to Deloitte, failure to act on this issue could result in even more significant losses, with estimates reaching as high as €6 trillion by 2070 in the European market alone. This highlights the importance of such investments in the long run.

Finally, the integration of digital technology, automation, and artificial intelligence will significantly impact a majority of occupations; in many cases completely transforming them. As a result, current workers will need to acquire a new skill set to remain productive. The impending skills gap is already starting to impact the global economy. This is why many companies are now prioritizing the development of skills that will allow their employees to thrive in this changing landscape.

Let’s break down some of the key technology trends that can help businesses incorporate speed and scalability into their digital transformation strategy.

The rigidity and high cost of ownership of traditional monolithic architecture make it impractical and outdated since it does not fully meet the scalability, adaptability, speed, and personalization requirements of today’s digital landscape. Migrating or adapting these systems to a more flexible microservices architecture is recommended for increased efficiency, scalability, speed-to-market, and significantly lower infrastructure costs. Migrating data to the cloud is also a critical speed and scale enabler in 2023 and beyond. By replacing cumbersome and poorly-scaled legacy monoliths with a microservices architecture, implementing autonomous applications and containerization, and utilizing tools such as auto-scaling, continuous delivery, and cost monitoring, companies can optimize their cloud usage for top performance and cost-effectiveness.

By pairing Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) cloud service models with tailored, industry-specific functionality, companies can create a comprehensive and integrated solution that seamlessly caters to all of their business needs, while saving on costs with a pay-per-use model.

• SaaS is a cloud-hosted, ready-to-use application software that provides on-demand access to necessary software applications.
• PaaS is a cloud-hosted platform and development environment to build, test, and deploy applications on demand.
• IaaS is the backend infrastructure to run applications and services in the cloud, and provides on-demand access to cloud-hosted physical and virtual servers, storage and networking.

This approach allows companies to be more agile and responsible, quickly adapting to new market conditions and capitalizing on rising trends.

With the overwhelming and ever-increasing amount of data that businesses accumulate from machines, devices, processes, and people, the need to collect, store, consolidate, filter, analyze, navigate, and gain value from data has become critically fundamental. And basic EDWs no longer make the cut for large, multi-faceted enterprises looking to gain maximum value with tangible results from their data. Implementing a cloud-hosted analytics platform on Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, or Microsoft Azure gives you the ready-to-use analytics capabilities specific to your industry at lower cost, greater scalability and speed than an on-premises EDW could ever achieve. Furthermore, by utilizing a robust analytics platform and implementing DevOps processes, you can boost the accessibility, quality, and accuracy of your data, while accelerating time-to-value significantly.

Creating a culture around using smart data for actionable insights is essential for success. Adopting DataOps and MLOps can improve the quality of data pipelines and enable data scientists to turn insights into action, such as optimizing production numbers to meet projected customer demand or avoiding major equipment failures.

Analyzing data for insights and automating processes is one thing. Continuously learning from and optimizing insights and automated processes based on accumulated knowledge changes the game entirely. An automated Machine learning platform can streamline and optimize repetitive tasks such as data processing and model training. This reduces employees’ time on these tasks, allowing them to focus on other essential business activities. Additionally, machine learning models can make real-time predictions and identify patterns and trends, helping companies to respond quickly to changing markets and potentially significant disruptions. The platform can be deployed on cloud infrastructure, allowing for scalability and handling large amounts of data, and integrated with an analytics platform.

By utilizing a machine learning platform, you can quickly gain valuable industry insights, personalize customer experiences, improve the productivity of your data science team, and make informed decisions on demand forecasting, fraud detection, process efficiency, pricing and trade promotion decisions, and a range of other significant business-critical activities.

Speed and scale are just one of the major trends to keep in mind for technology investments in 2023. To traverse the tumultuous waters of transformation and upheaval, leaders must thoroughly understand their industry, clientele, and the organization’s potential. Proficient leaders possess a prescient ability to discern the organization’s current state, and chart a clear course toward its desired destination. These leaders skillfully harmonize technological advancements and the utilization of human resources with this overarching understanding.

💡Read about other major tech predictions in our 2023 Trends: Digital Transformation and Innovation ebook.

Grid Dynamics is a digital-native technology services provider that accelerates growth and bolsters competitive advantage for Fortune 1000 companies. We have more than 15 years of experience in digital transformation trends and software innovation, and are ready to continue leading businesses to the forefront of their industries in 2023 and beyond.

Still have questions about speed and scale in digital transformation? We’d love to hear from you!