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| Edited By: Raveena Singh |Source: DNA |Updated: Mar 25, 2018, 03:31 AM IST
Deloitte's 'Tech Trends 2017 the Kinetic Enterprise' report highlights the key progressive trends that will transform the business landscape in 2017. While it consists of some mind boggling terms life dark analytics, machine intelligence and mixed reality, there is a disruption that lay in its shadow. Bill Briggs, the global chief technology officer for Deloitte Consulting, spoke to Raveena Singh about the kind of disruption these terms are going to bring, the eventual challenges to be faced by India and what Indian industries can do to cope with it. Briggs spoke on the sidelines of SingularityU India Summit, hosted in association with INK.
Advances in computer vision and pattern recognition allow companies to plumb the recesses of unstructured data, which may include images, audio, video and information residing in the "deep web." These tools can unlock powerful strategic and operational insights for businesses in the next level of technology-driven enlightenment. First is dark analytics. We are working on sounds to measure impending failure. My father was a mechanic.. single-most important tool he had was listening to the engine that helped him pinpoint what was wrong just by the sound of it. So we can use analytics to understand machine performance. Say, the frequency of a working fan is changed, meaning one of the blades is misaligned, which might cause a burnout in 18 months. But we don't do anything now. However, we can pre-read and replace the blade now and save resources. So dark analytics is specifically around traditional and unstructured data types. So we have been working on text and images for a while. Now we are moving to audio and video and putting together derived data to show me a person's emotional state by reading body postures and gestures.
Then the mixed reality is, which is bringing together internet of things, augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR). This is how a digital twin of an entire business at large can be created. So the companies need to look at the digital assets to make virtual experiences authentic for the enterprises and governments. AR and VR are getting a lot of attention in media, gaming and entertainment but we see massive and tremendous potential in businesses. This includes training, experiential learning and field service, where an employee who might not be an expert is being guided and given feedback by an expert through a complex repair. This is what I call 'evolution of digital' moving from a point, quit and type to touch, swipe and talk. The angle is to be beyond the glass (screen). We believe everything-is-a-service, which is the business rationale behind modernising the core applications. Blockchain this year is more around the trust economy. If we have visibility of personal identity and the digital representation of physical assets, then we can start building smart systems and an economy based on trust and the knowledge of the history of the company. For example, life sciences and pharmaceuticals.
There is a continuum for every company, including our own. One side is the hero's journey where he reinvents himself. The other side is the existential threat of destruction. The point is: can we have enough imagination to see both sides and enough confidence to take action? That's where Deloitte comes in to help shape that answer. We imagine the future and we act differently today. My favourite quote is "rather light your candle than curse the darkness". Disruption has no ill-intent or judgment behind it. It's how we place the proposition to a country and company with hope involved.
Automation has grabbed headlines for a good reason. About 60-70% of the potential workforce in India can be impacted by the same. This might seem like a contrarian view but I hope automation affects 100% of the Indian population because potential for augmentation of an individual and help them grow is tremendous. If you put the frame and ask what are we doing to help educate the workforce to push themselves beyond their existing boundaries, this might be the first push. There are jobs that can be created around them(employees). The challenge is that we see that potential turning real in the long term, but the transition period that has just begun is hard.
Every tech document we write has a risk implication, which is beyond security, privacy and regulatory compliance; it's the ethics and morality of the adoption panel. This needs to be an upfront part of boardroom discussions and if we do so, we will have an advantage over these fallouts and its implications.
However, in the short term, we are helping organisations rethink their own delivery model; there is a deficit of design engineering, script information learning and data science. Hiring may be based on four-year-certified degree, but is done more on the basis of capability and capability is now being democratised. There's open source, Google and MIT where you can quickly pick up the skills. Our workforce is moving where the location will not prohibit someone from reinvention. With gig economy in action, one can work in the best town with best people. I am hopeful, we are at the same pace rewiring operational dynamics with the pace of disruption driving job replacements.
The current situation of healthy tension is what leaders—government, civic, business, entrepreneurs—need to address. This phrase I picked up 20 years ago: we need fewer fingers and more thumbs. And we are seeing more thumbs.
Qualcomm has come out with a product, Tricorder X. This medical diagnostic and monitoring device that could diagnose 50 diseases just by keeping it close to the patient's body. Its purpose is not to just detect the disease but also to educate the person to take preventive measures and look at the recovery protocol. But technology comes with privacy concerns like in personal assistance systems. Privacy is a very simple equation of transparency and is one of the design principles that goes in a lot of our business models. On the flip side, privacy is also very personal. People may not want their data to be watched.
