Entries by Andrew Lobo

Kevin S. Parikh, CEO & Chairman, Avasant, featured in Forbes – From Omnichannel to Omniverse: Preparing for the Next Evolution of Customer Engagement

April 2022 in , , /by

Whichever industry you operate in, it is crucial to connect with people differently—to successfully compete, retain existing customers and attract new ones. Businesses need to start investing in the new digital prerequisites and building the channels and platforms to support customer engagement seamlessly across the physical, virtual and augmented worlds. Companies that are successful can realize, based on my predictions, up to three times the value of a product or service and will be drawn closer to their customers.

HR Outsourcing Service Providers Rising to Meet New Demands for Digital Transformation

February 2022 in /by

The HR function is evolving to meet the challenges of the labor market, which is increasingly being disrupted by labor shortages, pressure on wages, and the changing expectation of employees working from home. To address these challenges, enterprises are increasingly relying on service providers for flexible HR operations and digital transformation. This has led to a seven percent growth in HR outsourcing adoption between June 2020 and June 2021. Additionally, platform adoption continues to be at the core of HR transformation as enterprises extend their HCM systems or implement new ones. These trends, and others, are covered in our new Global Hire-to-Retire Business Process Transformation 2021-22 RadarView™.

Intelligent Automation Cuts Through Complex Workflows

June 2022 in /by

Intelligent automation (IA) is becoming a central component of larger transformation engagements. However, some automation projects suffer due to siloed, single-point solutions and a lack of agility. To solve this problem, enterprises are seeking new ways to leverage predictive and semantic automation, and new enterprise platforms are integrating automation to streamline business functions. IA service providers are also simplifying enterprise automation engagements through the implementation of digital personas and low-code/no-code (LCNC). As a result, IA is becoming more intuitive and showing a stronger return on investment. These trends, and others, are covered in our Intelligent Automation Services 2021–2022 RadarView™.

Blockchain: Building Trust in the New Normal

February 2022 in /by

During the pandemic, organizations slowed their blockchain investments as they gave top priority to business continuity, remote and hybrid work, cybersecurity, and digital transformation. Now, however, as we emerge from the pandemic, organizations are showing renewed interest in blockchain, especially around new use cases in the medical supply chain, healthcare surveillance, and procurement optimization. These emerging trends, and others, are covered in Avasant’s Blockchain Services 2021–2022 RadarView™.

Embracing Digital First to Transform Customer Service

February 2022 in /by

The global contact center outsourcing services industry grew 15% between 2020 and 2021. Lockdowns and social distancing made it difficult for enterprises to keep their contact centers operating at capacity, and outsourcing closed the gap. The pandemic has changed customer expectations, and customer service is becoming omnichannel and cloud-based. Contact centers are adopting hybrid work and using a contact-center-as-a-service (CCaaS) model to maintain business continuity and prepare for future disruption. These emerging trends are covered in Avasant’s Contact Center Business Process Transformation 2021– 2022 RadarView™.

UK Digital Service Providers Helping Accelerate Digital Adoption

December 2021 in /by

In 2020, the UK faced its worst recession over the last three centuries, with its worst quarterly GDP contraction of approximately 20% in Q2 2020. Its economy shrunk twice as much as any other G7 nation. However, despite the deep recession, a combination of government investments and enterprise commitment toward digital adoption pushed the economy farther along in the recovery curve. Digitally mature businesses are addressing rapidly evolving customer behavior by creating personalized experiences using artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced analytics and enhancing customer engagement by deploying virtual agents/chatbots to assist customers and resolve queries. Alternate business and operating models are gaining traction in the region. Global service providers are increasing market penetration through acquisitions and hiring. These emerging trends are covered in Avasant’s United Kingdom (UK) Digital Services 2021–2022 RadarView™.

SAP S/4 HANA and Service Providers Unlocking New Business Processes with Analytics

December 2021 in /by

Enterprises are adopting SAP S/4HANA to exploit new sources of revenue and streamline processes with the help of its big data and analytics capabilities. To respond more effectively to volatility in supply and demand, enterprises leverage SAP S/4HANA to improve visibility over business processes. Faster implementation cycles with the use of preconfigured solutions, fewer customizations, and agile development have gained traction, as enterprises are looking for faster time-to-value from their investment in SAP S/4HANA.

Compliance Requirements Driving the Move to Government Clouds

December 2021 in /by

The dramatic shift towards smart cities and a new digital economy is increasing the need for governments to upgrade their IT infrastructure. Cloud environments are the best way to ensure government systems are highly available and data is securely accessible. But until recently, cloud was not always an option for government entities due to strict compliance requirements. Now providers are catering to this need by setting up government clouds—sovereign data centers to employ local workers in the countries they intend to serve.

Unified Communications Transitioning from Business Continuity Tool to Strategic Must-Have

November 2021 in /by

The UCaaS Platforms 2021–2022 RadarView™ addresses the need for enterprises to replace their telephony infrastructure with a modern cloud communication platform and identify the right UCaaS providers to partner with. The 56-page report also provides our point of view on how UCaaS platform providers are catering to the changing needs of organizations through a wide portfolio of products and services, thus delivering a general ranking based on key dimensions of product maturity, enterprise adaptability, and innovation road map.

IT Operations more Intelligent as Automation Increases

October 2021 in /by

Enterprises are moving from reactive to proactive IT operations (ITOps) by leveraging intelligent automation to reduce unplanned IT downtime brought on by operational complexity. The need has never been higher for intelligent systems to prevent potential problems through AI-driven tasks such as automated remediation and preventative maintenance. In fact, about 60% of IT operations management contracts leverage some sort of artificial intelligence. These trends, and others, are covered in our Intelligent ITOps Services 2021–2022 RadarView™.