Although readers here at TMC (News - Alert) know that the global spread of new information technology assets is nothing new, the scope of that spread can often lie just beyond the reach of many industry reports. One recent study that may put one area of the globe back in to focus – Southern Africa – is the latest IDC (News - Alert) report, “The Path to Digital Transformation in EMEA and APAC.”
IDC noted in its report that enterprise mobility and adoption of cloud services is on the rise in South Africa. The origin of that report is the country’s largest city, Johannesburg, and shows that 27 percent of enterprises in the country have already begun use of enterprise mobility products in their operations – software that can help them manage their spread of mobile devices and wireless networks necessary for daily activities. Moreover, an additional 35 percent of surveyed companies said they had plans to adopt mobility software by the end of 2016.
Avaya (News - Alert), a developer of such applications and sponsor of the IDC study, provided a comment that explains the impact of mobility in today’s fast-paced economy. Danny Drew, the managing director of Avaya in South Africa, spoke for his company:
“To remain relevant, enterprises must move at customer-speed, embrace the opportunities created by digital disruption and seize the first mover’s advantage in their respective domains,” Drew said. “Organizations that stay ahead of the digital transformation curve will accelerate growth and increase stakeholder value.”
Avaya further noted that its goal in creating mobility applications is to exactly meet customers’ needs. IDC found in its study that the bulk of current enterprise mobility customers work in banking, telecommunications, and insurance. Notably, the banks that provided comments to IDC said they were interested in eliminating some of their physical branches and in favor of replacing those facilities with digital channels.
That a bank would close its brick-and-mortar doors in favor of Web-based services says a lot about the way in which customers want to complete their financial transactions. Many customers have begun to favor credit and debit over paper money, and they have begun to use mobile payment methods en masse. The growth is so quick at the moment that analysts predict a CAGR of the Africa mobile money market at 39.2 percent, which would have it reach more than $14 billion by the end of the decade.
IDC predicts that more banks and other types of businesses will follow suit as they become more adept at using digital methods of payment and business transactions. IDC also commented that the spread of the Internet of Things could help determine how and when companies begin to make their assets digital and rest those assets in the cloud.
Edited by Alicia Young