NORTH-EAST REGION ON FOCUS FOR MAKING DIGITAL INDIA PROGRAMME MORE PERVASIVE: GOVERNMENT TO CONNECT 55,000 VILLAGES WITH PHONES BY DECEMBER 2016

The telecom department plans to take mobile network by December 2016 to nearly 10 per cent of Indian villages that are still unconnected, to make the government's ambitious Digital India programme more pervasive. Of the 6,00,000 villages in the country, about 55,000 are still awaiting mobile connectivity.

These villages fall primarily under the red corridor — a vast swathe affected by left-wing extremism — and in the Northeast. 

Under the Rs 1.13 lakh crore mega Digital India initiative, the government aims to connect every nook and corner of the country with broadband Internet, and deliver services electronically through mobile phones. The TRAI had earlier in a study revealed major network gaps in the northeast region. Arunachal Pradesh had the highest coverage gap at nearly 56 per cent, followed by Meghalaya with 38 per cent, Mizoram with 32 per cent and Manipur 24 per cent.

In September this year, the Cabinet had approved spending of Rs 5,300 crore to install 6,673 telecom towers across 8,621 villages, primarily boosting telecom network along national highways in the Northeast.

"The department is setting up telecom towers in Northeast with a pecuniary budget of Rs 5,300 crore and additionally deploying 2,199 towers in left wing extremism affected areas. Setting up mobile phone network in the Naxal-affected regions is one of the long-pending demands of the home ministry, which has recently asked the telecom department to fasttrack deployment. The work would be completed by the end of September 2015 as per recent news. 

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Digital Revolution: Provide the Right User Experience!

The consumer has been at the forefront of mobility revolution in India. By the end of 2013, the total Internet user base in India was at 213 million, a 42 percent year-on-year growth. In the same year, mobile Internet user base grew 92 to 130 million. More than 100 million users from India are on Facebook. This growing adoption of mobility by Indian consumers is widely expected to fuel its adoption in the enterprise. In the last couple of years, surveys conducted by PwC among the CXO level staff cutting across industries have indicated a strong demand for mobility by enterprises. However, adoption of enterprise mobility is facing bumps along the road that are impeding adoption rates.

For Indian enterprises, challenges occur at different levels of the organization: senior management level and worker/employee level. A top concern for the senior management is security and compliance: how can data be protected from leaving the corporate walls? We also observe that senior management, under pressure to achieve short-term goals, cannot justify ROI for the additional investment. As far as workers and employees—the end users of mobility systems— are concerned, the key challenge has been providing the right user experience. Quite often, training sessions need to be conducted to overcome the learning barrier involved in understanding the system. Lastly, mobility architecture also comes with an overhead to manage the fragmented OS platforms. To sum it up, the top challenges impeding mobility adoption are:

(i) Security

(ii) ROI justification

(iii) Poor user experience and

(iv) Device fragmentation.

The good news for enterprises is that there are answers to all the challenges they face across the organization. Security concerns are being addressed by innovative solutions in the industry. Security software providers offer encryption at multiple layers: storage, network, cloud and mobile devices. Not only is data encrypted locally, it is also encrypted on storage devices that reside in the cloud. In the event of a data theft, the encrypted data is rendered useless since encryption keys are stored within corporate walls and the keys never leave the corporate firewalls. The Indian start-up ecosystem has started offering.

A majority of Indian CIOs says that enterprise mobility will play a critical role in conducting day-to-day operations in their organization. Many have also stated that mobility will be a key part of their enterprise strategy. However, enterprises, both large and medium, face challenges that are slowing mobility adoption.

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Shopping Behaviour has Changed!! More technology enabled with Multiple Channels...

The technology-enabled consumer’s shopping journey weaves in and out of many channels (web stores, mobile apps, social media, e-mail, kiosks, physical stores, contact centers and more).

During this journey consumers leave ever-larger digital footprints with a growing trail of personal data. This raises numerous questions and concerns, including:

• Who owns the data?

• What is the value of the data?

• How is the data being collected?

• How is the data being used?

• How is the data being protected against misuse?

Mutual Value is Key to Improved Digital Engagement

This growing complexity points to the importance of addressing digital engagement as a strategic business issue. Common principles at industry level can serve as a global foundation for creating an interoperable, flexible and accountable framework for coordinated multi stakeholder action. To develop trust and level the digital playing field requires balancing different stakeholder needs, with a goal of ensuring mutual value. Think of it as a “value triangle”: value to the consumer (in the form of rewards, better deals, more relevant offers, etc.), value to the business (improved insights, greater efficiency, more profitable growth), value to the society (improved efficiency, greater corporate social responsibility).

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NEED FOR SPEED: With higher internet speeds, the connection between humans and technology will tighten..

With higher internet speeds, the connection between humans and technology will tighten as machines gather, assess, and display real time personalized information in an "always-on" environment. This integration will affect many activities-including thinking, the documentation of life events ('life-logging'), and coordination of daily schedules. There will be changes across all aspects of life as internet connectivity advances by 2025.

As the internet closes in on speeds of 1 Gigabit, or 1,000 Mb, per second, it is expected to unleash a new set of applications, significantly altering the online as well as the offline existence of individuals and companies, impacting education, health care and business. However, it could widen the digital divide.

In the past every major advance in bandwidth has brought new innovation that has led to new services and applications to digital life. "In the internet's early days, slow modems facilitated email; faster dial-up modems helped websites become usable; early broadband roll out allowed for quicker sharing of relatively big files such as the MP3 music files that were shared on the first peer-to-peer services like Napster; later broadband advances allowed for streaming activities that have given rise to services like YouTube, Amazon Prime, and Netflix," the report said.

With higher internet speeds, the connection between humans and technology will tighten as machines gather, assess, and display real-time personalized information in an "always-on" environment. This integration will affect many activities-including thinking, the documentation of life events ('life-logging'), and coordination of daily schedules.

NEED FOR SPEED:

Things possible when Gigabit connectivity (1,000 Mbps) becomes more popular

• Your interactions with doctors, educators, merchants, and others will consist not of emailed forms or pre-recorded messages but of instantaneous, life-like video interaction that require no set-up or configuration.
• The past generation had to manually document their lives but we are looking at full video lifestreaming in the near future. Lifestreaming from ultrasound to final illness will be the killer app.
• It will be much cheaper and more convenient to have that monitoring take place outside the hospital. We will be able to purchase health-monitoring systems just like we purchase home-security systems. Indeed, the home-security system will include health monitoring as a matter of course. Robotic and remote surgery will become commonplace.
• Wearing clothes that are tailor-made, 3D-printed at home, will also become normal, with the previous day's clothes recycled efficiently; the school day will dis aggregate into a number of learning sessions, some at home, some in the neighborhood, some in pairs, some in larger groups, with different kinds of facilitators.

If there is a digital divide now, it will still exist in 2025. The divide's existence will be magnified by the new killer apps - who has access and who does not, beneficiaries and those left out.

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6 Key Areas essential to any Retailer’s Transformation Strategy as Retailing continues to change rapidly because of digital technology

In the midst of the extraordinary change being driven by online retailing, major retailers worldwide are continually adjusting strategy to create value. But competing priorities and distractions can lead retailers to forget perhaps the most important underpinning of all strategic imperatives: customer empathy. The irony of this, and the appeal, is that based on this simple frame of reference – putting yourself in your customers’ shoes – most retailers already know how to win.

In the name of innovation, many retailers often implement new systems that are intended to reduce cost, improve sales and be good for customers, but, in fact, if they had listened to their customers the retailers would have learned they wanted something different.

Although all industries are still in the midst of digital transformation, other industries, such as travel and banking, aren’t as fixated on channels and haven’t fallen into this trap. They have learned to deliver seamless, convenient, non-intrusive, enabling experiences. Retailers that do the same have the best chance of balancing returns on investment and increasing share of wallet with delighted, brand-loyal customers.

Bottom-line takeaways in six key areas essential to any retailer’s transformation strategy: mobile, social media, personalized marketing, cross-channel integration, loyalty, and digital shopping.

1. MOBILE - Mobility is perhaps the most important channel of all. Retailers need to adopt a “mobile-first” model for deployment to shoppers and associates given the inherent rapid change and ubiquity of mobile interaction. The vast majority of shoppers are now connected almost every waking hour of their day. But retailers haven’t caught up.
2. SOCIAL MEDIA – Although shoppers are very active on social media, it’s their platform and they really don’t want the noise that many retailers generate: more than 60% of surveyed shoppers said their purchases are not influenced by social media.
3. PERSONALIZED MARKETING – Personalisation runs hot and cold. Retailers understand the power. Shoppers are hungry for more relevant, customized experiences.
4. CROSS-CHANNEL INTEGRATION – Customers want it all – the convenience of online shopping with the comfort and immediacy of the in-store experience. And they want to use their devices to research and price check while in stores. The tip of the Omni channel spear is “buy online pickup in-store.” It’s the most tangible, proven way to engage and identify customers across channels. 
5. LOYALTY – Loyalty programs, when done well, are good for retailers and their customers. But retailers are not leveraging loyalty anywhere near as well as airlines and hospitality companies. Shopper satisfaction with retail loyalty programs is generally low. Although retail loyalty programs do create loyalty, and shoppers are enrolling (92%), impact could be substantially increased by improving perceived value and ease of use.
6.  DIGITAL SHOPPING – Digital shopping (Web and mobile) continues to be an important – and threatening – channel both for transacting and influencing in-store purchases. More and more shoppers are looking to brand Web sites, e- tailers and other online competitors. With increased price transparency and expectations for faster, lower-cost delivery also comes increased threat to the bottom line. What do shoppers want? A collective experience online! No single feature is more important than the rest.

Shoppers want robust information, easy access to service, a variety of payment options, stored profile information, and real-time offers. Retailers must rely on their online experience, price and product selection to differentiate themselves from the competition.

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CIOs need to decide how they will position the IT organization in relation to emerging digital business technologies, such as the Internet of Things, 3D printing, wearable technology, robotics and cognitive systems.

Regardless of your industry, every CIO will need to prepare for the upcoming digital business technologies and the impacts it will have on the enterprise.

CIOs should use this research to start forming their positions on digital business technologies, and to prepare their IT organizations with the right resources and skill sets.

Two key attributes will cause some CIOs to hesitate in making digital business technologies part of the IT organization's responsibilities:

1. Digital business technologies are operational in nature. The IT organization is used to owning and supporting "back office" and infrastructure technologies. Digital business technologies are aimed at supporting "front office" and operations.
2. Digital business technologies are emerging technologies. Drones, the IoT and cognitive systems are not commonly part of the IT agenda.

However, we encourage CIOs to understand how relevant these technologies are, and will be, in their industries, and to give them a fair assessment. There is much at stake — in both business value and technology investment.

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