IoT is a piece of a larger IT strategy and should not be treated as a unicorn

/by

Let us begin with the bad news: Many IT and operational technology (OT) vendors were disappointed — and some incurred damage or had to scramble to realign — as the IoT opportunity failed to live up to inflated expectations prevalent between 2015 and 2017. Many anticipated far more rapid growth than was reasonable, given that IoT is neither a technology nor a market, but a technique or a class of solutions. Many also thought that version 1.0 of horizontal IoT platforms was a fast and easy sell. An early victim was General Electric (NYSE: GE), but TBR expects other large names to narrow their IoT businesses and investments, if they have not already, and several smaller names to disappear or get eaten by bigger fish as they find themselves spinning their wheels in the mud with nondifferentiated portfolios.

The good news: Starting in late 2018 and continuing into 2019, TBR has observed the IoT opportunity recovering as lessons from the difficult times have led to increased sanity and smarter messaging around IoT. We believe that the pace of IoT project implementation is increasing, but that the mix has shifted to smaller projects. Over time, however, the number of active projects will grow and the amount of data they produce will also grow, leading to an accelerating growth curve.

TBR believes a few significant realizations and realignments are driving acceleration:

  • IoT really is not a market (although that is the easiest way to describe it) nor a technology. It is a technique for applying technology. It is not a very novel technique, but rather an evolution of IT solutioning that includes sensors. More vendors and customers are coming to understand what IoT is and are avoiding the perception of IoT as something that is new, novel and complex, making it easier for vendors to leverage IoT to help customers overcome business challenges. With IoT being treated as one tool in the larger IT solutioning toolbox and the focus turning to solving the end problem, rather than defining the technology needed to get there, vendor-customer relationships are back to business as usual. Vendors do not have to get bogged down in education cycles as much because customers understand IT solutioning, and vendors can focus on delivering solution components instead of getting embroiled in discussions on the perception of IoT as a discrete and transformational technology and the complexity, hesitation and perceived risk that stem from that.
  • IoT is not easy. This is true for two reasons: because customer organizations are complex and have numerous stakeholders with differing priorities, visions and systems, and because IoT is rarely implemented in and of itself. IoT is more often tied with existing or new systems, such as product lifecycle management, supply chain management, enterprise resource planning software, or a multitude of specialized software from ISVs. Adoption is largely from the bottom up in organizations, but customer IoT champions and vendors are realizing that adoption must be supported from the top down to extract maximum value from IoT. Customers are increasingly adding CIO and chief digital officer (CDO) roles to guide holistic, consistent transformation, and vendors are investing in sales strategies targeted at the C-Suite, such as innovation centers and improved messaging. To answer the second challenge, vendors are learning that they cannot address everything alone and must partner to tackle the variety of interconnected systems and build best-in-class solutions.
  • Being the best at a few select components of IoT is better than being OK at everything. Thousands of vendors are attacking the IoT opportunity, culminates in a busy, confusing and hypercompetitive market for customers. Winning vendors are finding their swim lanes and exploiting their niches, such as self-service Amazon Web Services (Nasdaq: AMZN), application-focused Oracle (NYSE: ORCL), embedded-driver Dell Technologies (NYSE: DELL) and things-focused Bosch. These vendors are increasingly known for being the strongest in their chosen niches, and their narrower focuses not only make them prime targets for systems integrators to pull into solutions but also make partnerships easier, with joint go-to-market efforts proving to be a winning strategy for vendors to employ beyond their legacy customer bases. 
  • Packaged solutions are emerging. With customization comes cost and complexity, anathemas to the customer base, especially large customers. As vendors begin packaging components together for shared applications or to address common challenges, costs are beginning to develop boundaries, helping customers understand exactly how IoT can be used and what to expect in terms of ROI. TBR expects packaged solutions to drive steady market growth moving forward. Each solution has its own growth curve, with some being quite rapid—but taken together, these solutions are delivering accelerating but moderate growth.

The 3Q19 Commercial IoT Market Landscape looks at technologies and trends of the commercial IoT market. Additionally, TBR catalogs and analyzes more than 520 customer deals by vertical, uncovering use trends, identifying opportunities, examining maturity, and discussing drivers and inhibitors.

KPMG is on the right path as the firm delivers connected, powered, trusted transformation

/by

Connected, powered, delivered with trust: KPMG’s ambitions for its clients  

KPMG’s approach to digital transformation revolves around the firm’s concept of the “Connected Enterprise,” an organization fully embracing information technology, networking and data to take every advantage of existing and emerging technologies. In KPMG’s view, fully embracing IT requires an enterprise’s transformation efforts be sustainable and cross-functional; that is, not simply transformation to a new state, but an ongoing, ever-evolving change process, executed across an entire company, not simply within one functional area, geography, or line of business. As a comprehensive vision of digital transformation, KPMG’s Connected Enterprise serves as both an aspiration and a road map, particularly when coupled with the expertise, capabilities and experience KPMG believes it brings to clients. During the event, both formally and in sidebar conversations, KPMG professionals reiterated the firm’s commitment to delivery, from strategy and road mapping through advice on funding transformation, based on KPMG’s core expertise in finance, and through to implementation and managed services. Multiple client examples, some described in this report, brought forward that commitment and reinforced KPMG’s strategy-heavy emphasis.

When the firm shifted to emerging technologies, the Connected Enterprise became empowered: According to KPMG, the firm brings clients functional transformation advice, deep industry knowledge and expertise transitioning to the cloud. And underpinning the firm’s core strengths around strategy consulting and emerging capabilities around technology, KPMG touted the trust clients have developed with the firm and KPMG’s ability to reassure clients their digital transformations will be connected, powered and secure. In TBR’s view, KPMG’s framing around digital transformation does not differ sharply from its Big Four peers, with “connected, powered, and trusted” echoing both the structures and themes used by PwC and EY, in particular. In the near term, minimal differentiation may not matter to clients. As these firms all begin to more aggressively court new logos, KPMG may need to find a unique way of describing its digital transformation vision if it has yet to establish enough differentiation.

KPMG may find differentiation with its Ignition Centers, even as the field is increasingly crowded with these kinds of immersion, innovation and transformation spaces. As described in detail by KPMG’s leaders, the 25 globally dispersed Ignition Centers “make technology real” for clients and allow clients to “see what tech feels like” within a KPMG setting, but attuned to the client’s specific needs. For KPMG, these centers supply the engine for the firm’s innovation agenda, providing the culture and the space for an “ideas to outcomes” framework for clients’ people processes and technology. Further, the firm’s leadership described “sensory advantage capability” — the ability to look at markets and trends, anticipate what will be coming, and then draw conclusions, with specific context, for clients — as critical to both the Ignition Centers and how KPMG views innovation.

In KPMG’s view, the firm has developed expertise around reading “signals of change from an outside perspective” and relating those signals to client-specific content. All of this — the innovation, technology and future sensing — enables KPMG to translate clients’ needs into strategy for a Connected Enterprise, deliver a detailed and tech-supported road map, and then implement the digital transformation.

As with the firm’s overall framing around digital transformation, TBR cannot be certain the Ignition Centers differ substantially from PwC’s Experience Centers, EY’s wavespaces or the 20-plus other centers TBR has visited in the past three years. In discussions with KPMG professionals around client selection and preparation, staffing and talent management, and technology partner inclusion within the Ignition Centers — all concepts researched extensively by TBR — no substantial differences emerged, suggesting KPMG has at least kept pace with the evolutions to date, if not necessarily leading peers in developing new ways of leveraging these centers.

In mid-June, KPMG hosted more than 50 analysts for an extensive series of large sessions and breakouts intended to showcase KPMG’s capabilities, offerings and innovations. With multiple clients on hand for both the opening dinner and presentations across the following daylong session, TBR had the opportunity to hear why clients select KPMG and the different digital transformation challenges KPMG has addressed. TBR also met one-on-one with KPMG leaders and partners, hearing directly from them the firm’s overall strategy, internal metrics, and sense of where KPMG fits within the consulting market.

Key findings from TBR’s Quantum Computing Market Landscape

/by

While quantum computing continues to make strides, market limitations and technology exploitation are ongoing concerns

Quantum computing vendors continue to make major strides in the technology. Decoherence and qubit quality remain ongoing challenges for which vendors continue to research enterprise-grade workarounds. However, there are challenges facing the quantum computing market landscape that even the smartest physicists and engineers cannot counteract. The first is the looming skills gap that will exist when quantum computing becomes more mainstream. Many customers and vendors alike do not see quantum computing taking off in the near term, despite evidence to the contrary. As such, a majority of organizations are not investing in quantum capabilities, which will lead to a massive influx of demand for quantum-skilled workers once these organizations all begin to rapidly adopt quantum after an adequate number of proofs of concept have convinced the skeptics. Some skills can be retooled from existing capabilities, but others need to be taught through years of schooling. TBR believes this is an opportunity for professional services vendors such as Accenture and Atos, but also for quantum-centric vendors, to invest in the education of future generations. IBM recently announced education-centric investments in Africa, suggesting vendors are recognizing the skills gap that looms and the opportunity that will emerge by investing ahead of the curve.

Determining how to secure both quantum and classical compute instances against bad actors remains a persistent challenge. There are ways to mitigate this persistent threat by adapting cybersecurity capabilities, but the challenge is that, as with other skills shortages, many organizations do not believe this threat is close enough to worry about. Given that TBR research has shown it can take three or more years to adapt current security measures to be quantum safe, organizations, especially those with highly sensitive information in their possession, should begin to monitor this challenge.

The quantum computing market will achieve economic advantage in the next two to five years, one algorithm at a time. Once this is initially achieved, developments will be swift as customers are likely to find ways to repurpose existing algorithms for new uses. While quantum computing brings with it the promise of great, positive change, it also brings the threat of malicious players leveraging this technology for negative purposes, increasing a focus on quantum-safe security developments in line with quantum computing developments. The swift impact of quantum computing will be a key factor in determining who wins and who loses in this technological transformation.

We need to talk about the data

/by

TBR believes that creating common terminology and understanding around data is key to successfully implementing an evolutionary digital transformation strategy, one that enables the organization to transform incrementally, as it capitalizes on new opportunities and deals with new challenges. Essential to this approach to digital transformation is an organizational cultural transformation, one that embraces continual innovation and ongoing collaboration across departments and disciplines and that enlists all parties in the process of harnessing organizational data assets to move the organization forward.

The many uses and users of data

It is commonly accepted that IoT represents the intersection of IT with operations technology (OT). This is true, but only part of the story. Business management is another key player in many projects, and TBR believes it should be a component in all IoT projects. In fact, potential users of data from IoT projects extend beyond these three stakeholders, including many of the departments throughout an organization, such as marketing and sales. To deliver the greatest possible value from any project, including but not confined to IoT, all the potential users of the data should be considered in the design and evolution of each project.

In the early stages of the recent surge in IoT, three to four years ago, the different stakeholders were often brought together for workshops or ideation sessions to invent new solutions made possible by IoT. As IoT has become more common and relevant players are more familiar with common use cases such as status monitoring and asset tracking, there has been less need for this challenging and expensive invention phase of IoT projects. Instead, new projects are often undertaken entirely or almost entirely by OT, sometimes working with IT to ensure compliance with company standards. These projects can confidently deliver a positive ROI while only using data for a single purpose, usually operational efficiency. Potential other uses for the data, or from data that could be generated by the solution, are often not considered in the design. This can be a waste.

The data generated from an IoT project often have value beyond the immediate purpose of the project. For instance, data from a status monitoring solution can be used to identify patterns that could predict service-related incidents. Similarly, comparing status reports across different assembly lines or factories might help identify superior or deficient configurations. Status reports could be correlated with operations speed to help identify either capacity problems or the potential for greater capacity. Capacity limitations or windfalls affect both marketing and sales.

The same kind of potential repurposing of data can be found for most IoT projects. Data has multiple uses. Different people within the organization are able to recognize different potential uses. Uses can be classified into short term and long term. Status data is valuable immediately. Indeed, for the purpose of reacting quickly to status deviations, the data has no long-term value. A solution built for only that purpose would often discard the data to minimize project cost, resulting in a loss of the potential value of the data for long-term analyses. To extract the greatest value and meet broader organizational needs, other people in the organization should be involved in the project design.

5G deployments are expanding, but CSP revenue generation will remain minimal in the short term

/by

5G is becoming a must-deploy technology for an increasing number of CSPs globally, prompting accelerated build-out timelines and broader rollouts

The 5G era is progressing as several countries expanded or commenced commercial 5G deployments in 2019, particularly the U.S., South Korea, Australia, the U.K., Germany, Spain, Italy and Switzerland. An increasing number of communications service providers (CSPs) globally, predominantly in developed countries, are accelerating and broadening the scope of their 5G build-outs. There are a few reasons for this pull forward, including the need for CSPs to stay competitive for customers of traditional mobile broadband and high-speed internet services, reducing the cost per gigabyte of carrying traffic (network opex efficiencies), and building a foundation in preparation for new use cases of the network. The availability of 5G devices, including a variety of smartphones, in 2019 is another key driver prompting earlier infrastructure investment.

Though 5G deployments are accelerating, TBR expects CSP 5G revenue generation will be minimal in the short term as consumers will be slow to adopt 5G devices due to their high prices and limited initial 5G service coverage. TBR believes business customers will provide the greatest opportunity for long-term 5G revenue generation as use cases requiring the ultra-low latency and accelerated data speeds enabled by 5G will be more prevalent in the enterprise space. CSPs are positioning to support enterprise 5G use cases by investing in innovation centers and targeting private 5G network customers.

TBR’s 5G Telecom Market Landscape tracks the 5G-related initiatives of leading operators and vendors worldwide. The report provides a comprehensive overview of the global 5G ecosystem and includes insights pertaining to market development, market sizing, use cases, adoption, regional trends, and operator and vendor positioning and strategies.

Will algorithm patents replace economies of scale as the most critical barrier to entry?

/by

Manufacturing scale matters less as we pivot to a knowledge economy

Economies of scale as a barrier to entry have been a fundamental precept taught for years in economics classes worldwide. Capital had to be invested ahead of being able to create value, and then people could be hired to staff the capital equipment to produce goods. Having both capital assets and existing volume gave companies a distinct competitive advantage. It drove both vertically integrated companies as well as horizontal holding company models, with the latter made famous by Jack Welch’s oversight of U.S. blue chip company General Electric.

Technology today has greatly reduced scale as a competitive advantage. Virtualization and abstraction have led to business theorists talking increasingly about asset-lite business models and asymmetric competition. Clouding this pivot is the emerging discussion around consumer scale. This is a competitive edge gained not necessarily from capital scale, but by capturing consumer brand loyalty that generates the scale. This concept is often discussed as the “force multiplier” or the network effect of the ecosystem. It is giving rise to additional new terminology, such as multi-enterprise business networks, in which partnering and the joining of complementary assets enable all participants to benefit from the aggregation of intellectual property, which is fed to the entire ecosystem of loyal customers.

Humans have the big ideas; curating those ideas into scalable advantage requires technical skills, automation and patent protection

When consumer loyalty generates cash, that cash can be deployed to fund projects, such as small-scale, smaller-dollar-volume projects akin to becoming an internal venture capital (VC) arm for any future product and service innovations. This concept manifests itself in the notion of fast failure and rapid iterations that are anathema to scaled manufacturing best practices. Being successful requires having people who are insightful about what businesses or consumers want and how to turn those wants into an automated piece of software — in short, algorithms.

As virtualization and software abstraction move the economy ever closer to utility computing, first discussed in the late 1980s by technology futurists, and as quantum nears economic advantage, the mission-critical business competency will be writing algorithms to apply against the ubiquitous data traffic being generated and stored throughout the computing utility network. Faster compute leads to faster exploration and discovery. Faster discovery leads to shorter product and service cycles and therefore shorter competitive advantage windows.

As such, algorithms that generate these new insights will increasingly become the way enterprises generate wealth, as well-skilled individuals push the limits of conventional wisdom and then deliver these new insights. Preserving that ever-shortening advantage will come from increased vigilance in protecting intellectual property. Thinking and creativity provide the advantage. We hear time and again at analyst conferences about how skills are in short supply and how people are a firm’s greatest asset. TBR expects to hear more frequently about the patent protections around these automated ideas.

Clean blockchain data fed to quantum will accelerate the value of algorithm patents

Accurate data will be available in real time for these algorithms to run against to generate real-time decision-making guidance. As automation removes more and more human toil from the economy, only individuals at the point of creation or the point of consumption will be critical to the business, with the algorithms mining the consumer demand to test against the next big idea to come from well-skilled humans and converted into competitive advantage through an automated algorithm run against real-time, accurate data.

As explored further in TBR’s Quantum Computing Market Landscape, in the quantum computing realm, where insights and actions can be obtained exponentially faster, the IP advantage is also exponentially greater. Think of the traveling salesman example that comes up regularly in quantum conversations: If a delivery company can patent an algorithm that speeds up delivery rounds and makes deliveries more efficient overall, that could swiftly create extinction events in the delivery market. If we extrapolate this, emerging technology has the potential to fundamentally alter competitive landscapes by generating faster and more accurate insights.

TBR analysts will be attending the Quantum.Tech conference Sept. 10-11 in Boston. Please contact your account executive to coordinate a conversation with TBR analysts at the event.

HCLT improves position in DMS with portfolio investments, but must leverage its niche expertise to capitalize

/by

Digital marketing services provide HCLT with an entry point for transformation opportunities

As clients look to transform CX and pursue omnichannel projects using technology solutions, the DMS space provides growth opportunities for vendors that can generate engagements by bridging together CX offerings with digital platforms to drive clients’ marketing campaigns. Bringing data to the center of the engagement, collected from sources throughout clients’ organizations and combined with analytics, will lead to future initiatives for both the client and vendor.

While HCLT has traditionally avoided large-scale investments around its DMS portfolio, the company has recognized demand for services and growth opportunities within the DMS space, which we believe guided the company’s March 2019 launch of a digital marketing platform, HCL ADvantage Experience. Based in Adobe Experience Cloud, the platform works with multiple marketing sources to collect and store customer data that supports clients’ user experience and enables HCLT to quickly scale clients’ marketing campaigns, including compatibility with legacy systems, through improved user integration on a DevOps framework. The platform will support HCLT’s position to capture application services opportunities, but the company will face pressure from other vendors that have developed similar platforms, limiting its ability to differentiate and compete for growth opportunities outside of existing clients.

Where HCLT’s partnership with Adobe does not necessarily provide an enhanced position for a vertical play, integrating HCLT’s engineering and R&D services capabilities and legacy data from its manufacturing and automotive expertise would enable HCLT to leverage a vertical strategy and better connect with vertical industry clients as well as begin to create separation from competitors.

Additionally, HCLT used its April 2019 acquisition of Strong-Bridge Envision, a U.S.-based digital consultancy, to expand the strength of its Mode 2 services and solutions to support business outcomes for clients through data insights. Strong-Bridge Envision joined HCLT’s Digital & Analytics portfolio, which bolsters HCLT’s position within the DMS space in the U.S. and supplements existing offerings, allowing HCLT to pursue consulting-led engagements with more specialized expertise on digital strategy, business transformation, CX and organizational change management. We expect HCLT will look to expand wallet share and mindshare from existing clients as well as generate consulting-led opportunities, but may face challenges in gaining permission around C-Suite-level conversations. Focusing on its mature verticals, such as financial services, technology and services, and manufacturing, which collectively contributed 57.3% of total revenue for HCLT in 1Q19, may be an easier path for the company to follow as it holds stronger client relationships and market share. While HCLT is able to pursue opportunities within other verticals, we believe financial services, technology and services, and manufacturing serve as a starting point from which HCLT can begin to build its brand around DMS and DT-related consulting before expanding into other areas.

TBR estimates 30% of total global CSP spend (capex and external opex) will be on or related to NFV/SDN in 2023

/by

5G will push CSPs to accelerate and broaden their NFV/SDN initiatives

According to Technology Business Research, Inc.’s (TBR) latest NFV/SDN Telecom Market Forecast, covering 2018 to 2023, 5G will push CSPs to adopt a new network architecture and both NFV and SDN will be critical aspects of that architecture going forward. As such, TBR expects NFV/SDN-related spend growth will correlate with 5G deployments. Since CSPs will need to upgrade their networks from an end-to-end perspective to realize the full potential of 5G, this will naturally drive CSPs toward the virtualization and cloudification of their networks. This trend will impact most, if not all, of the major network domains from an NFV/SDN perspective over the next five years. TBR notes that 5G core is inherently virtualized and that this will also naturally push CSPs deeper into the NFV/SDN space over the next five years as they transition to a stand-alone 5G network.

Rakuten’s legitimization of vRAN will also drive NFV/SDN market growth

Though significant skepticism remains in the industry that Rakuten will be able to make the vRAN model work, should this scenario occur, TBR believes it would embolden CSPs to double down on their own NFV/SDN initiatives, especially as it relates to vRAN. RAN is one of the costliest domains in the construction of a network, and it is a key area CSPs will be keen to virtualize to reap cost savings.

White-box adoption will proliferate, portending significant OEM disruption

TBR expects the use of white-box hardware in NFV/SDN environments will proliferate through the forecast period, accounting for 60% of NFV/SDN hardware spend in 2023, up from 15% in 2018. This industry shift toward white-box hardware will significantly disrupt incumbent OEMs’ business models, prompting them to evolve into software-centric companies. Industry organizations such as the Open Compute Project (OCP) and initiatives spearheaded by leading CSPs such as AT&T will fuel the rapid uptake of white boxes during the forecast period.

Telefonica models the transition of a traditional telco to a digital service provider

/by

Telefonica represents a prime model of the opportunities and challenges telecom operators will experience as they evolve into digital service providers. The digital era will enable telecom operators to become more agile and profitable as they transition away from more costly legacy network technologies and business models. The digital era will place greater expectations on telecom operators, however, as customers will turn to digital service providers to support a broader range of services and use cases.

Telefonica will benefit from recognizing that it is just a single entity competing in a vast digital ecosystem composed of a multitude of players, including other telecom operators, webscales and OTT video providers. Collaborating with the broader technology industry will enable Telefonica to reduce the cost of developing in-house solutions while enabling the company to more effectively support customers’ digital ambitions.

The 2019 Telefonica Industry Analyst Day showcased Telefonica’s (NYSE: TEF) evolution from a traditional telecom operator to a digital service provider (DSP). Telefonica is positioning as a leading global DSP through its progress in virtualizing and cloudifying its network and IT systems as well as the company’s capabilities in emerging technologies, including AI, machine learning (ML), big data and edge computing. Telefonica’s digital transformation initiatives are yielding significant cost savings as the company modernizes its network infrastructure and customer service platforms while creating new services to enhance user experience and support advanced use cases. Telefonica will face challenges in the digital era, however, including growing competition from webscales, regulatory hurdles, and unproven demand for use cases in areas including 5G and edge computing.

Atos at the edge of technology

/by

With the launch of BullSequana Edge and investments in quantum computing, Atos takes a pragmatic approach to executing digital transformation initiatives

For a few years, the impact of big data has created ebbs and flows in buyers’ behavior in end-consumer interactions and IT purchasing patterns, as is typical with any technology. Consumerization of business applications, demand for data quality and governance, and the adoption of connected technologies compel vendors such as Atos to explore opportunities around managing customer data and to invest in solutions that can help them protect their competitive edge.

During the Atos Technology Days 2019 opening keynote, Atos CEO Thierry Breton announced BullSequana Edge, the company’s first edge server to power AI everywhere. Built with the goal of delivering lots of power, including 165-teraflop capacity, that is stored locally, the appliance enables Atos to address the upcoming shift in data localization. Breton stated that while 80% of data globally is stored in data centers and in the cloud, that percentage is expected to shrink to 20% by 2025 as clients seek ways to analyze data in real time at the edge, where it is created. The addition of AI capabilities amplifies Atos’ position as an end-to-end services provider within the IoT space and closes gaps in the asymmetrical relationship between IT and operational technology (OT) departments.

Additionally, BullSequana Edge helps Atos address challenges of exponential data volumes and heterogenous data complexities due to the advent of AI and machine learning (ML), necessary blocks supporting the data economy foundation. With optimized security capabilities including infusion detection, disc encryption and secure boot, the BullSequana server enables Atos to alleviate common pain points of IT and OT, especially as the company builds and offers vertical-centric solutions with the hardware. Although offering a hardware appliance drifts Atos further from pure systems integrators (SIs), which typically manage asset-light portfolios, it brings Atos closer to key IT buyers, which remain the centralized governing body of the final IT purchases, even in discussions that include the C-Suite.

Atos also continues to enhance its quantum computing capabilities. As TBR wrote in its May 2019 Digital Transformation Insights Report, which focused on quantum, “Atos took its strengths in design computing for appliances and programming and emulation environments and announced several quantum research initiatives, including the opening of a global R&D lab in Yvelines, France, and Atos Quantum Learning Machine (QLM) implementations in Europe and the U.S. to enable clients to experiment with disruptive technologies, tackle the explosion of data and accelerate the number of practical use cases across industries. Additionally, about a year ago, Atos developed a consulting practice around quantum computing to educate and advise clients on whether it is possible to use quantum to accelerate business applications. During Atos Technology Days 2019, Atos announced myQLM, a light version of a QLM, which is an on-premises environment designed for quantum software developers. Users can download myQLM on their desktops and use a set of algorithms to train remotely, at home, at universities and research centers, and simulate the actual QLM. A Phyton-based language, QLM allows students and researchers to develop and share code within the community, creating additional entry points for Atos’ broader services portfolio. With customers ranging from universities and research centers to high-performing computer ecosystems and commercial clients, Atos, is building one use case at a time. For France-based oil and gas company Total, Atos is using a QLM simulator to accelerate the analysis of seismic activities, helping Total stay ahead of competitors. Atos is also working with Bayer and RWTH Aachen University in Germany to evaluate the use of quantum computing to research and analyze human disease patterns.“

Our analysis further states that we expect Atos to “monitor the underlying scientific and engineering breakthroughs of the competing architectural investments and accelerate the commercial utility through its development of leading-edge use case applications” in concert with its business partners as it looks to quantum to gain a competitive advantage. For Atos, partner ecosystems, such as with Fujitsu, 1QBit, Rigetti, IBM Q and D-Wave, will play a critical role in its ability to accelerate the development of business use cases.

Navigating the dynamics of the IT services markets demands vendors demonstrate innovation, which allows them to gain trust with new buyer personas. While many of Atos’ SI peers have invested heavily in areas such as marketing services to better appeal to the CMO buyer for customer experience opportunities, the company relies on its full technology stack to expand its addressable market. While some investments, such as in quantum, may not have sizable, tangible impact on its performance, Atos will benefit from being first to market once economic advantage is achieved.

According to a TBR special report on quantum and economic advantage, “What we do not know is how fast quantum computing will take off and what impact it will have on our knowledge as a society. What we do know is that it will take off — algorithm by algorithm, as economic advantage is achieved incrementally — and fundamentally change what we know.” TBR’s Digital Transformation Insights Report further states, “As vendors continue to battle business process and technological hurdles across all three phases of digital transformation — substitution, extension and transformation — quantum will be the one technology that will fundamentally transform enterprises and the way they go to market and sell products and services,” placing Atos in the spotlight through its innovation investments.

Atos Technology Days 2019, held in Paris on May 16 and 17, displayed myriad practical applications of emerging technologies. Held alongside one of the largest events centered on startups in Europe — Viva Technology, with 124,000 attendees, 13,000 startups and 3,300 investors — Atos Technology Days presented an excellent platform for Atos to showcase its innovation capabilities across its entire portfolio stack, including hardware, applications and services. Running under the theme Welcome to the Post-cloud Era, the presentations walked over 200 clients, partners, executives and industry analysts through Atos’ vision of the IT of tomorrow, centered on the edge, quantum, IoT and cybersecurity as well as Atos’ ability to stitch it all together to deliver business outcomes to its customers. Data is exploding, and Atos is preparing to accommodate this phenomenon by effectively managing, storing, securing and analyzing data.