According to IDC, global spending on digital transformation is forecast to grow 16.3% annually for the next five years, reaching $3.4 trillion in 2026. Not all that investment, however, will be fruitful. A Boston Consulting Group (BCG) study has found that only one-third of digital transformations are successful.
The complexities of change
Digital transformation involves multiple stakeholders and relies heavily on integration across business units. As the technology architecture for digital solutions becomes increasingly complex and costly, poorly managed digital transformation can lead to system vulnerabilities, data silos, and other costly IT headaches.
Against this backdrop, digital transformation as a service (DTaaS) has emerged as a solutions-led approach to help organizations adapt to a fluctuating business environment. It combines multiple technology solutions—from cloud computing to AI—on a single platform for continuous end-to-end transformation.
“Digital transformation as a service helps rebuild an organization from the ground up to make it more efficient and more flexible, empowering it with the agility to respond to new market opportunities faster at scale,” says Wong. “Because IT complexity is growing, many businesses are opting for technology consumption models that revolve around services. Echoing the B2C market, which offers a variety of subscription services, enterprises can now turn to services ecosystems that make it easier to manage IT and optimize buying, deploying, managing, and scaling infrastructure without incremental capital expenditures.”
DTaaS in action
When China-based Huzhou Central Hospital wanted to create a digital solution in 2018 to help doctors monitor and manage patients with chronic medical conditions, they needed to ensure that their existing on-premises data center would be able to handle the vast volumes of data that would likely be generated. Stringent regulations also prevented the hospital from relying on a public cloud for storage and computing resources.
The hospital turned to Lenovo, which designed, developed, and deployed a new chronic disease management solution that helped improve the speed and accuracy of diagnoses. Thanks to Lenovo’s TruScale Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) solution, the facility gained access to a platform with the security and control of an on-premises environment, pay-as-you-go pricing, 24/7 monitoring, and much sought-after scalability.
Driving the need for a new model
Digital transformation has become a permanent fixture in many organizations—IT complexity, mounting competition, an increasingly distributed workforce, expanding cyberthreats, and rising demand for business continuity and sustainability are just some of the reasons behind the trend. However, many organizations are not equipped to deal with these challenges.
A lack of strategy can be a main hindrance. “Without a clear strategy and goals, it can be difficult to prioritize and focus on the most important digital transformation initiatives,” warns Wong. Employee resistance to change is another obstacle to successful digital transformation, as many workers fear automation could jeopardize job security.
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