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Tech Leaders Look To IoT, AI & Robotics To Fuel Growth Through 2021

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  • 30% of tech leaders globally predict blockchain will disrupt their businesses by 2021.
  • IoT, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics have the greatest potential to digitally transform businesses, making them more customer-centered and efficient.
  • 26% of global tech leaders say e-Commerce apps and platforms will be the most disruptive new business model in their countries by 2021.
  • IDC predicts worldwide IoT spending will reach $1.1T by 2021.

These and many other insights are from KPMG’s recent research study Tech Disruptors Outpace The Competition. The study can be downloaded here (PDF, 42 pp., no opt-in.).  The methodology is based on interviews with 750 global technology industry leaders, 85% of whom are C-level executives. For additional details on the methodology, please see pages 32 and 33 of the study. The study found that the three main benefits of adopting IoT, AI, and robotics include improved management of personal information, increased personal productivity, and improved customer experience through personalized real-time information. Key insights gained from the study include the following:

  • IoT, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics have the greatest potential to digitally transform businesses, making them more customer-centered and efficient. Tech leaders also see these three core technologies enabling the next indispensable consumer technology and driving the greatest benefit to life, society, and the environment. KPMG’s research team found that tech companies are integrating these three technologies to create growth platforms for new business ventures while digitally transforming existing business processes. Tech leaders in the U.K. (21%), Japan (20%) and the U.S. (16%) lead all other nations in their plans for IoT digitally transforming their businesses by 2021. Please click on the graphic below to expand for easier reading.

  • 30% of tech leaders globally predict blockchain will disrupt their businesses by 2021. 50% of Japanese tech leaders predict that blockchain will digitally transform their industries and companies by 2021, leading all nations included in the survey.  IoT processes and the rich, real-time data stream sensors and systems are capable of delivering is predicted by tech leaders to be the primary catalyst that will enable blockchain to digitally transform their businesses. 27% of tech leaders globally expect IoT data and applications combined with blockchain to redefine their companies, supply chains and industries. Identity authentication (24%), automated trading (22%) and contracts (14%) are the 2nd through fourth-most disruptive aspects of blockchain by 2021 according to tech leaders. Please click on the graphic below to expand for easier reading.

  • 26% of global tech leaders say e-Commerce apps and platforms will be the most disruptive new business model in their countries by 2021. 19% see social media platforms creating the majority of new business models, followed autonomous vehicle platforms (14%) and entertainment platforms (11%).  KPMG's analysis includes a ranking of top business models by country, with e-Commerce dominating four of the five regions included in the survey.

  • 50% of tech leaders expect media, transportation, healthcare, and transportation to experience the greatest digital transformation in the next three years.  Respondents most mentioned Amazon, Netflix, Alibaba, Uber, Google, and Facebook as examples of companies who will digitally transform their industries by 2021.  The following table provides insights into which industries by country will see the greatest digital transformations in the next three years. Entertainment platforms are predicted by tech leaders to have the greatest potential to digitally transform the media industry in the U.S. by 2021.

  • Tech leaders predict IoT's greatest potential for adoption by 2021 is in consumer products, education, services, industrial manufacturing, and telecom. AI's greatest potential to digitally transform business models is in healthcare and industrial manufacturing (both 11%), consumer products, financial, and services (10% each).  As would be expected, Robotics' adoption and contribution to digitally transforming businesses will be most dominant in industrial manufacturing (15%), followed by healthcare (11%) and consumer, financial and services (10%). Please click on the graphic to expand for easier reading.

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