Today we are still caught up in the validation and relevance of managing a business through platform thinking by making the business case of its value and impact. We should not be; it is time for you to hop onto the train.

The ability to present a compelling business case for the use and application of platforms is overwhelming. I think I have well over 100 plus arguments for their use, value, impact and application.

For me, platforms are needed as we face a very different economic landscape.

We need to choose where to focus in the future, where to concentrate our resources and attempt to bridge the fragmentation that is occurring. The world of collaboration, where we can find partners to share and reinforce what we do, is leading to new dynamics of combining.

Platforms are more viable and relevant.

Platforms allow you the opportunity to innovate in very different ways. They can add value through collaborations that can add more to the internal efficiency options through learning and sharing. Platforms help manage the difficulties of transitions we are all undergoing and change how we see the world through a broader collaborative set of lenses.

We are all being forced to make new Strategic Choices

As we look at where platforms fit within our business, we make strategic choices- are we looking for performance improvements, leveraging greater growth, tapping into a more distributed innovation capability or simply shaping new value strategies?

Today platforms are a key essential layer of infrastructure that scales participation differently.

They provide different options to improve performance and grow a new footprint in markets, products, and collaborations. Platforms can leverage assets and external capabilities you do not need to own or build; they provide fresh options to innovate, capture different and new value in insights and diversity of thinking, and allow for a higher pursuit of learning advantage.

We must consider the value of the combined effect of ecosystems, platforms, marketplaces and portfolios.

We can explore and exploit so much platform potential that fits with each individual company’s needs.

There are so many key questions to ask, to seek clarity too and how they can be positioned to reduce barriers to entry, commercialization and learning.

As we live in an unevenly distributed world, platforms can provide a better levelling effect, enable a way to thrive in a connected world and help offset eroding barriers we are all facing.

Let’s take FIVE underappreciated value points of business platforms.

1. Platforms are the new operation glue between end users, business developers, institutions, and manufacturing points. The ability to deploy digital software on machines enables the connecting, exchanging and talking to each other and managing a very different supply chain. Platforms are becoming the essential key layering point of infrastructure and operational management to orchestrate this through. They build out different assets, leverage the existing and optimise the potential within the existing ones to deliver a highly connected world to operate and manage within.

2. Platforms allow you to explore and experiment. Through the power of digitalization, you can re-imagine, capture, share and build from your imagination through a virtual world into the real world of realization. You have through platforms the process of honing discovery and collaboration, validating and extracting different designs, concepts or improvements on what you have

3 . Today, everything we build needs to be constantly reshaped, built upon in added ways, reshaped again and continually challenged and changed. We are in the world of circular design, and platforms rapidly become the exchange point for informing and transforming. Platforms are becoming the new flow centres that allow constant motion and offer disproportional potential, where numerous small moves can and do offer big things. It is how you influence this new set of connected dynamics that will determine

4. Platforms are the mechanism to resolve scale, broaden out the scope and enable a higher speed.  Collaboration and networks working through good business platforms can reduce barriers to entry by achieving access to technology advancements, having accessible tools and added infrastructure and enabling a more liberalization of one entity’s constraints in access to resources, learning and gaining from others.  In having available different financing options, scaling through 3rd parties and new avenues to talent and customers, different communities and sharing different and new practices all have a real combination effect.

5. Growing your business through Asymmetric Business thinking. What is your core? What will grow it in highly complementary ways? How can you cross traditional industries by leveraging what you have, combining it with technology and offering a higher value of what your core asset provides? Here we are dealing with the economics of compliments that depend on or require using another product.

So, where does Asymmetric thinking gain by being applied through platform thinking? Platforms provide you with new business model options.

Let me expand on this further as the Asymmetric Business Model opportunity requires a platform approach.

Google and Facebook are attention-based models that discover feed and generate the revenue that business pays through their portfolio of Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger and Facebook. Google has a search engine for users to find anything, and businesses and publishers gain keywords to build their content around. If you take the creation of software app development drives the demand for core products, home printers depend on ink cartridges, so they each can complement and reinforce.

The economics of compliments you find on a platform will allow you to diversify, connect and grow your business.  A digital platform offers software applications, access to sophisticated tools, technology, expertise, and learning. It builds out (your) functionality and brings different levels of flexibility that can sit on top of what you have already achieved.

I have taken five different aspects of platforms here.

The combination effect of what a business platform can achieve for you is actually endless in its applications. As I mentioned earlier, I think I have well over 100 plus arguments for their use, value, impact, combination and application that can be explored, adapted and combined.

Platforms provide you with new business model options that allow you to move across different industrial sectors that were not possible without all the economics of complementaries.

Ecosystems and Platforms are the new collaborative business need.

By applying different platform business thinking, you can consider commoditising different aspects of your business value to strengthen your core assets in new value-added ways. Most importantly, you have the (equal) chance of bundling complementaries with your core from software and digital offerings and combining AI & Human intelligence to effectively compete and differentiate yourself with leverage that gives added value to your customers..

For instance, you can own and control less but share and partner more as you shift from a given asset into a collective intelligent one, leveraging all the essential parts that having access to a technology platform can provide.

Platforms are about organizing and resolving complex structures, they offer a new network business model that needs to be deployed to meet a new economic landscape. They can be a fundamental building block to finding new ways of business value creation, offering that base to a new model of collaboration and competition.

I have outlined a case for change in a recent article, “thinking out the evolution of platforms and ecosystems.” if you have the opportunity and time

I would argue platforms are your future business journey.

They are highly relevant for growth and diversification and offer a sustainable pathway. You build more dynamic capabilities to sense and seize opportunities quicker in your highly connected world.

The post Exploring points of value in adopting Business Platforms. first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

A three-part series of posts exploring the what, why and how of Siemens Xcelerator- this is part three– how it does it and why.

This post is about “how Siemens Xcelerator does it and why,” from my perspective.

My aim in three separate posts all linked here is to explore the Siemens Xcelerator, firstly what it is, secondly, what it does and thirdly, how it does it.

These three posts are “looking into” Siemens. I am looking from the outside to see the value of this launch announcement of the Siemens Xcelerator Digital Business Platform. The launch proposal offers much.

How Siemens Xcelerator does it and why means what?

The stated objective: “Siemens AG has launched an open digital business platform, Siemens Xcelerator, to accelerate digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility. The business platform makes the digital transformation easier, faster and scalable.”

The real key here is the open connections between solutions and all engaged parties in the interactions and transactions.

What, why and how of the need for a B2B Digital Business Platform

The evolution of platforms needs to be thriving business ecosystems that offer a radical change in emphasis for all to collaborate around, share and build together. Achieving this requires an ecosystem mobilization and a platform strategy that delivers open technical and commercial frameworks, has a high ease of use and implementation ethos and looks to provide superior value creation and implementation.

Siemens Xcelerator digital business platform sets out to provide those three essential pillars needed 1) a thriving ecosystem of partners, 2) a growing, robust portfolio of bundled solutions to meet specific needs, and 3) a marketplace where interactions and transactions can be made to purchase hardware, software and service solutions, that are tailored to individual needs.

Bringing the Platform offering together

The depth and breadth of the collaborations and engagement undertaken between the participants will drive toward different value propositions. To specifically build a platform that seeks interaction and engagement from developers, and start-ups, seek involvement from SMEs to big tech companies, to draw in services, consulting, and integration partners, all forming the enabling environment.

Siemens Xcelerator sets out to provide the mechanisms to recombine technology and provide multiple new logic layers to build upon today’s existing business logic by bringing together the technical applications that are modular, cloud-connected and built on standard application interfaces (APIs) that adhere to the design principles of interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service where offerings are constantly upgraded.

It is the rich choice provided in portfolio offering, ecosystem partners and a marketplace selection coming together that are providing the right technology and solutions that provide the robust platform to seek out information, advice, and expertise. This combination effect enables a thriving community that can explore in confidence, have levels of protection and trust and refer to user experiences to evaluate compatibility within their specific operating and business environment.

Ones that can accelerate the digital transformation by offering growing customization, easier, faster and scalable solutions through growing levels of cooperation and collaboration, A “go-to source” where discoveries and existing solutions become interoperable, increasingly personalized and customized to solve individual problems yet can become repeatable and scalable, assembled and disassembled to meet changing circumstances or market conditions.

The essential need for Platforms and Ecosystems in today’s business world

Ecosystems and platforms are not today’s story of partners simply selling, delivering and servicing the offering, but it is about collaborating, engaging, mobilizing, creating, and designing within a network of partners that see real value in the ecosystem, one that builds out on open, shared value models.

I repeat a quote from Peter Koerte, the Chief Technology and Strategy Officer at Siemens, who recently stated in a podcast: “It’s a complex task. You need to have the hardware; you need to have software; you need services. So, nobody holds the key, nobody. So, there you go. You need to have an ecosystem that is orchestrated where you have created a portfolio delivered to our customers or to the customer to solve their problems. And that’s where we realized that Siemens very often already held the key with regards to having some of the critical components already, but not all of them. And so, we clearly said, okay, if we can bring them all together: the service providers, the software partners and the hardware – and this is very important, including the hardware – then we can make a big difference.”

Today it is suggested that 70% of digital transformations fail, so we need a different approach.

So, why do digital transformations fail? The barriers are made of several significant impediments; often of inherent inefficiencies, the fear of disrupting the traditional business model process by changing technology or existing architecture, having the constant concern of dealing with business continuity if you set about undergoing change, will the results keep that remaining competitiveness or bring about a new business positioning all contribute into the varying levels of mindset about adopting technology adoptions, and the concerns of deciding the right investments that prevail today. There is a real complexity in solutions and managing any digital transformation.

The future is emerging but in highly collaborative ways.

Today in business, the recognition is this need to be constantly redefining and improving performance, requiring a continuous evolution to accommodate the pace of technologies pace of change, coupled with the new emerging technologies of machine learning, automating data analytics, AI, Automation options and the sheers scale of data sets stored increasingly in the cloud to extract insights and fresh value.

To position today and for the future, there is the need for flexibility, adaptivity, agility and innovation. Being positioned for being stronger in response and resiliency. Adopting the organization to a constant stream of knowledge insights, combining connected learning and requiring continuous learning. All of this requires a radical change. It needs a community, a thriving, evolving ecosystem of like-minded or valued supporters to help you to adapt and change, to accelerate the digital transformation. Those who network, collaborate and co-create are better positioned to adapt and provide a more sustainable business connected and responsive.

Business today is also recognizing the value of as-a-service to support scale, take advantage of constant change in providing continued updates, and manage a business to its throughput and needs. You need as much fluidity in your assets as you can manage.

Ecosystems and platforms are better positioned to handle future dynamics.

Today, the market environment is constantly dynamic and rapidly changing, more competitive and demanding. The best chance of achieving sustainable revenue is to be highly fluid and adaptive to meet these rapid changes. In modifying and adapting to changing conditions, the key is achieving an adaptive, flexible operating environment, this requires it to be fully digitally connected, respond and adapt swiftly, and align with the right partnerships and networks, to draw down expertise and solutions. Being part of a thriving ecosystem is becoming essential to meet these rapidly changing and ongoing market conditions.

Siemens is well-positioned as a leading Industrial and Technology company in B2B solutions covering industry, buildings, grids and mobility to facilitate and orchestrate a digital business platform. Siemens has the expertise, history and trust built up over 170 plus years. The Siemens Xcelerator is designed for openness, reusability, and interoperability through a partner and customer network to solve individual customer problems.

Placing software, hardware, and services in a network of partners and customers at the core of Siemens Xcelerator solutions allows innovators, developers, pioneers, and businesses of any size to come together and solve complexity in easier, faster, and scalable ways. The solutions are designed as building blocks that are basically fundamental elements, so these can be deployed across various contexts and challenges.

Solutions can be built, combined and optimized more contextually while gaining from leveraging these components built up in common open standards and defined specifications. for this, interoperability and contribution to larger solution systems, providing a plug-and-play across each other and a re-bundling effect through additional new building blocks that “build on” for continued improvements.

The bottom line for Siemens in their rationale to launch this Xcelerator digital business platform is to find solutions with partners that set about breaking down data silos and customer challenges helping companies to increase their performance, productivity, flexibility and sustainability to enable faster innovation and value creation, to transform even further on what they have today.

To succeed, you need to imagine a dynamic, living system constantly being used, explored, improved upon and having value extracted continuously; Siemens Xcelerator’s digital business platform, I feel, is aiming to be positioned as highly valuable in a B2B environment to contribute to and accelerate the digital transformation. The power of the ecosystem of partners in building a portfolio of modular solutions and providing these in a marketplace open to all offers a radically new approach to tackling industrial design as it is highly collaborative and relationship dependent.

Disclaimer: This article is published in partnership with Siemens. Siemens is paying for my engagement, not for promotional purposes. Opinions are my own

The post Siemens Xcelerator- part three- how it does it and why. first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

A Series of Posts exploring the what, why and how of Xcelerator- part two

In this series, I felt there is a need for a deepening or exploring of what Siemens Xcelerator is all about. What are the implications and value opportunities for customers, distributors, partners, or analysts?

My aim in three separate posts all linked here is to explore the Siemens Xcelerator, a new Digital Business Platform, firstly what it is, secondly, what it does and thirdly, how it does it.

These three posts are “looking into” Siemens. I am looking from the outside to see the value of this launch announcement of the Siemens Digital Business Platform. The launch proposal offers much. The first post I recommend reading provides context to “what Siemens Xcelerator is.”

This post is about “what it does,” from my perspective.

The stated objective is that “Siemens AG has launched an open digital business platform, Siemens Xcelerator, to accelerate digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility. The business platform makes the digital transformation easier, faster and scalable.”

Peter Koerte, the Chief Technology and Strategy Officer at Siemens, recently stated in a podcast, “Xcelerator not only brings all of the critical digitalization components together – the service providers, the software partners and especially the hardware – it also provides both technical governance and interoperable solutions.

You realize this Xcelerator launch is very much for the longer gameplay.

Peter also provided further insights “At Siemens, we serve many different customers. So we are doing this in industry, we are doing this in buildings and infrastructure, and we’re doing this in mobility. And we saw that there is an incredible amount of work that goes into digital transformation and that many customers are coming to us and asking, please, can you help us?”

“The realization was, look, what we want to bring to our customers is solutions that are easy, fast and scalable. And this is what we hear over and over again: you have a bespoke solution that doesn’t work for me”.

The idea is to follow these design principles and provide more tailored solutions.” Peter then went on to explain: “it’s like Lego blocks where you very easily assemble and disassemble, and you just pick what you need. You really can get to these easy, fast and scalable solutions for our customers.”

Peter then explained: “And it’s a complex task. You need to have the hardware; you need to have software; you need services. So nobody holds the key, nobody. So, there you go. You need to have an ecosystem that is orchestrated where you have created a portfolio delivered to our customers or to the customer to solve their problems. And that’s where we realized that Siemens very often already held the key with regards to having some of the critical components already, but not all of them. And so we clearly said, okay, if we can bring them all together: the service providers, the software partners and the hardware – and this is very important, including the hardware – then we can make a big difference.”

The recognition from these positioning statements is that solutions have to be open, flexible, personalized and to be individually customized and need interoperable solutions to clearly work with each other then we come to What Xcelerator intends to provide.

Let’s step back from this terrific set of insights and have a back-to-basics review.

To cater for this strategic ambition, the B2B market needs, first and foremost, a change in emphasis, one of thinking out the evolution of platforms into ones designed to build thriving business ecosystems (B2B enabled) for all to collaborate around and build together.

So what is the Siemens Digital Business Platform?

What if you now reflect on what Siemens is proposing- a more open, collaborative platform, sharing their substantial portfolios, building out an ecosystem of certified partners as well as building out a marketplace of solutions that can be applied across the most significant markets of Industrial application, Buildings, Energy Grids and Transport. A Digital Business Platform that is governed as an intelligent, integrated and orchestrated one, provided in a single source and place but open, collaborative and certified.

So the “What If”becomes clearer in my mind.

The purpose is to create new product services and business models in the solutions provided. Solutions that accelerate revenues drive efficiencies through automation, improve profitability, enhance the customer experience, ensure compliance and link the ecosystem of partners for revenue and operational solution delivery for new client opportunities and improvement. Driving the digital transformation.

It needs to ask basic questions like, “can this proposal overcome the inherent inefficiencies overcome the disruptive traditional forces and present restricted business models?” “Can the solutions enable more sustainable business continuity? Can it change the nature of competitive advantage and shift the present mindset about technology adoption and risk?

Seeing a future and embracing it

Perhaps it is likely that Siemens recognizes where the future of digital transformation needs to go and sees a better approach to this digital transformation through this launch. A view reflecting that digital transformation requires a continuous evolution, fundamentally redefining the business operation and customer experience in highly connected, digital ways across an ecosystem of like-minded solution providers. Siemens, for me, has signalled that they are moving towards a new business model to take them even further as a focused technology company.

Siemens is opening up their solutions, combining these with others so the platform can provide a stronger response, a more resilient, agile, flexible and knowledge intense digital and real-world potential to boost productivity and competitiveness to scale up innovation through a digital transformation.

Siemens has signalled a new journey in a world that seems in a continuous state of flux and needs a more connected ecosystem, portfolio agility and robust, growing Marketplace for all to shop based on the Xcelerator Digital Business Platform (Website here)

So what Xcelerator Digital Business Platform does?

Digital Business Platforms create new digital business capabilities by recombining existing technologies and providing the platform for partners, customers and providers of services to come together and take these often individual solutions into a new level of connection to integrate these technologies, concepts and ideas to create new and disruptive capabilities that accelerate the community and advance the digital transition.

Any platform certainly needs to be of architecturally sound design to maximize the opportunities this recombination offers to digital transformation. Xcelerator is positioning itself to provide that as the platform orchestrator and provide the governance and undertake the lead. Xcelerator can transform.

You certainly stimulate ideas in platforms through engagement and interactions in a community-centric marketplace.

A critical part is to leverage data and as well as exchange ideas, build out software solutions within the collaboration space. Marshall Van Alstyne, who co-authored a great book “Platform Revolution” is the Questrom Chair Professor, Boston University and a Digital Fellow at MIT, commented on the power of leveraging data: “What I think is interesting,” Marshall stated, “is that one of the impediments to B2B [business-to-business] platforms has been [that] we haven’t had the frequency of interaction we’ve had in B2C [business-to-consumer] platforms. Machine to machine, device to device, will dwarf the number of interactions among people. And so, I think we should absolutely anticipate huge transitions towards these platforms and these models………to capture the value created”

Delivering digital transformation easier, faster and at scale

So for me, a strong platform for building out a growing portfolio, connecting an ecosystem and providing a marketplace does offer all involved the opportunity to create, deliver and capture new value in what the platform provides if it applies the governance and design principles, and rigour suggested, is timely and can transform the market dynamics in radically different ways.

Siemens Xcelerator offers the power of the network effect, a growing ecosystem of partners, designers, distributors and customers who can jointly accelerate the digital transformation. Today it is collaborations, relationships, cocreation and customer-centric solutions that change today into tomorrow for a different, connected future.

My third post is the last in this initial series that looks deeper into Siemens Xcelerator and explores “how it does it” coming up next.

Disclaimer: This article is published in partnership with Siemens. Siemens is paying for my engagement, not for promotional purposes. Opinions are my own

The post Siemens Xcelerator Part Two- what it does first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

Siemens has signalled a new journey in a world that seems in a continuous state of flux.

One that needs a more connected ecosystem, portfolio coupled with a robust, growing Marketplace for all to explore, based on the Siemens Xcelerator Digital Business Platform (Website here) that will enable a greater digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility.

The stated objective is that “Siemens AG has launched an open digital business platform, Siemens Xcelerator, to accelerate digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility. The business platform makes the digital transformation easier, faster and scalable.”

In a Series of Articles, I will be exploring the what, why and how of Siemens Xcelerator.

I felt there is a need for a deepening or exploring of what Xcelerator is all about. What are the implications and value opportunities for customers, distributors, partners, or analysts?

This post is about “what it is,” from my perspective

My aim in three separate posts all linked here is to explore the Siemens Xcelerator, firstly what it is, secondly, what it does and thirdly, how it does it.

These three posts are “looking into” Siemens. I am looking from the outside to see the value of this launch announcement of the Siemens Digital Business Platform. The launch proposal offers much.

Let’s break this “what it is” up into the critical parts

Firstly what does open mean?

Clarity always needs to be made on what open means for the digital business platform. Is this platform any different from the others claiming to offer a platform solution? The customer today constantly worries over any form of lock-in, and the need to spell out what open means becomes paramount.

As I understand it, there is no “vendor lock-in, it is open, and the data resides as and where the customer determines. Secondly, over time, the entire portfolio of hardware and software will become modular, cloud-connected and built on standard application programming interfaces (APIs) to allow open access.

Another critical ‘open’ is that Siemens Xcelerator includes a curated portfolio of internet of things (IoT) to enable hardware, software and digital services across Siemens and certified third parties. Siemens is building a growing ecosystem of partners; and an evolving marketplace to facilitate interactions and transactions between customers, partners and developers.

The open digital business platform creates value for participants by facilitating interactions and fostering innovation between multiple parties – customers, partners, developers etc., as no one can do it alone.

A curated platform

The “curated part” for IoT-enabled hardware, software and digital services will follow key design principles of interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service. This set of design principles enables APIs to be interoperable – to work.

An API stands for Application Programming Interface. API is a machine-to-machine interface where one machine makes a request, and the other machine responds to it. The interface can be thought of as a contract of service between two applications. This contract defines how the two communicate with each other using requests and responses. Interoperability is the ability of different systems, devices, applications or products to connect and communicate in a coordinated way, without effort from the end-user.

This makes whatever is offered on the Siemens Digital Business Platform open to enable data to exchange freely. That exchange of data is what Digital Transformation is about, generating data insights and connecting the physical world, i.e. machines and the data virtual world, to be able to simulate, predict, monitor, anticipate and achieve the potential to connect your operating world up with others that bring a different value, in speed, value or business model.

We now come to the actual value points of “what it is” from this Siemens Xcelerator Digital Business Platform.

 

Recognizing the interlinked three pillars of this open Digital Business Platform

Firstly the PORTFOLIO is building quite naturally out on the four main parts of Siemens AG’s current business, of leading solutions for industry, buildings, grids and mobility of its entire portfolio of internet of things (IoT) enabled hardware, software and digital service, not only from Siemens but increasingly from certified third parties made up from hyperscalers to independent software vendors.

The portfolio is transformed towards more open applications, with more cloud-based and as-a-service solutions and IoT-enabled hardware that can be constantly upgraded. At the same time, the collaboration will reach a new level with a growing ecosystem of partners.”

Suppose you are looking for accelerating digital transformation within your organization, no matter your business size or industry. In that case, Siemens Xcelerator makes collaboration easy and gives you access to a vibrant ecosystem of partners, developers and peers. This portfolio will encourage a growing ecosystem of partners that share the design principles of interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service to build a growing portfolio.

The ability to build a vibrant ECOSYSTEM of Partners

Presently there are over 50 credited partners, including the hyperscalers of Accenture, Atos, Bentley, Deloitte, Microsoft, Nvidia and SAP but the value in exploring this growing ecosystem is the niche company or a specialist in a given application or solution that has deep domain knowledge of the industry application.

The Siemens certified partners ecosystem is set to expand rapidly now that the launch is behind Siemens.

Recently, I published an article on Siemens is building a powerful industrial partner ecosystem. That links to the growing international partner network, and the global partner finder can be found on the website. https://new.siemens.com/global/en/company/topic-areas/partners/industry.html).

If you are interested in becoming a Siemens Ecosystem Partner, so you can together innovate faster and enhance business outcomes for customers, go to this link.

The MARKETPLACE that is offering scope, content and functionality selection for your business

A Marketplace positioned today as an underlying and evolving marketplace to explore, educate, exchange and purchase. The Marketplace is set up to 1) Build & Sell, 2) Consult and Service or 3) Enable and Run. The Marketplace breaks down the topics and the vertical market searches, so potential solutions can be identified easily. Go to this link to explore the Marketplace.

There are 200 solution offerings within the Marketplace offering scope, content and functionality. Although Siemens covers a wide range of industries, the current vertical markets are Commercial Buildings, Higher Education, Food & Beverage, Healthcare, Pharmaceutical & Life Science, power Utilities and Transport. The Topics are presently contained to Cybersecurity, Efficiency, Experience, Flexibility, Resilience and Sustainability.

Specific offerings within the Marketplace termed X, are following the design principles of interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service completely, are initially Building X and a Grid X suite. These are offering a modular, fully cloud-based open software suite as available. Integrating the internet of things (IIoT) solutions across industries will emerge under Industrial Operations X, which brings sensors to the edge, to the cloud and is designed for a comprehensive IT/ OT integration of knowledge and capabilities.

Finally, I return to why Siemens has launched Siemens Xcelerator- the need for accelerating the digital transformation.

Presently, it is claimed that 70% of digital transformations fail. Many projects are often caught in pilot purgatory, and the realization of the digital transformation needs a radical ramping up, a step-change in approach.

This is the rationale for Siemens to launch their Xcelerator digital business platform.

The need is for a radically new approach. The ones that have taken on digital transformation have found it complex and demanding. It challenges much, can upend the business entirely, and that becomes a risk to undertake. Yet, these digital transformations have been undertaken often in isolation or with limited partners; this needs changing.

Siemens has signalled a new journey in a world that seems in a continuous state of flux and needs a more connected ecosystem, portfolio agility and robust, growing Marketplace for all to shop based on the Xcelerator Digital Business Platform (Website here) that will enable a greater digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in the industry, buildings, grids and mobility sectors.

Disclaimer: This article is published in partnership with Siemens. Siemens is paying for my engagement, not for promotional purposes. Opinions are my own

The post Many moving parts to Siemens Xcelerator. Part one – what it is? first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

The power of the Siemens industrial partner ecosystem is in having partners combining their domain expertise, with the Digital Enterprise portfolio of Siemens to solve real-world challenges and create value for customers.

Building a powerful industrial partner ecosystem

How do you set about building an open, inclusive ecosystem that enables global knowledge sharing and open collaboration?

A fascinating session held at Hannover Messe 2022 by Siemens was entitled “Master digital transformation and accelerate business value through a powerful industrial Partner Ecosystem”, bringing together representatives of a solution group, moving towards 2,000 solution partners, that work within the platform provided by Siemens.

The concept provides an ecosystem approach that combines different partner expertise to tackle and support the digital transformation needed to break down silos and think well beyond the walls of the present customers’ current configuration within their factories to turn them into a Digital Enterprise.

The forum’s design is an open, highly collaborative way to solve problems, resolve challenges and build out a customer’s environment to benefit from the connected solutions that technology enablement brings.

The concept is to build on what each partner has already gained from their experience and expertise, delivered to their customers, to share and provide services and technology solutions to different Siemens customers that bring them higher business value and impact.

To read more on this review visit

ingenuity.siemens.com • 1 min read

Conclusion

Disclaimer: This article is published in partnership with Siemens. Siemens is paying for my engagement, not for promotional purposes. Opinions are my own

The post Siemens is building a powerful industrial partner ecosystem first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

Today, 29th June 2022, Siemens launched Siemens Xcelerator across its entire portfolio to accelerate digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility. The business platform makes digital transformation easier, faster and scalable.

Xcelerator is an open digital business platform, that will enable hardware, software and digital services from across all of Siemen’s portfolios and also will bring in certified third parties, to provide a growing ecosystem of partners, provide an evolving marketplace to accelerate the digital transformation and provide interactions and transactions between customers, partners and developers. The really big story is the moving toward an Industrial Metaverse through the power of this Xcelerator platform and its future potential in a new exciting partnership with NVIDIA.

This is a step-by-step transformational journey

Roland Busch, President and CEO of Siemens AG remarked Xcelerator “is the logical next step in the implementation of our digitalization strategy to enable even faster innovation and value creation. Siemens Xcelerator brings the power of our focused technology company together with a thriving ecosystem of technology partners. We are joining together to simplify digital transformation so that customers of all sizes can benefit at speed and scale.”

He went on to state “Siemens Xcelerator will make it easier than ever before for companies to navigate digital transformation – faster and at scale. By combining the real and the digital worlds across operational and information technology, we empower customers and partners to boost productivity, competitiveness and scale up innovations.”

“Our leading portfolio is transformed towards more open applications, with more cloud-based and as-a-service solutions and IoT-enabled hardware that can be constantly upgraded. At the same time, the collaboration will reach a new level with a growing ecosystem of partners.”

Siemens generated Euro 62.3 billion in revenue in fiscal 2021, employing around 303,000 employees worldwide that provides solutions to more resource-efficient factories, resilient supply chains, and smarter buildings and grids, to cleaner and more comfortable transportation as well as advanced healthcare. Siemens states very clearly it creates technology with purpose, adding real value for customers.

What Siemens Xcelerator comprises and will move towards achieving

Xcelerator is a curated portfolio, a growing ecosystem and an evolving marketplace that will build out over the coming months and years. The complexity of this transformation is huge. and will be taken step by step.

It is a very big deal with the commitment of “Siemens will transform its entire portfolio of hardware and software to become modular, cloud-connected and built on standard application programming interfaces (APIs). The highest standards and value for all parties will be ensured by strong technical and commercial governance principles. Siemens and third-party offerings will adhere to the design principles of interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service”

In my view, to take their “entire leading portfolio and transform it towards more open applications, with more cloud-based and as-a-service solutions and IoT-enabled hardware that can be constantly upgraded. At the same time, the collaboration will reach a new level with a growing ecosystem of partners.” is a massive undertaking when you adhere to these design principles of offering interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service.

The launch event was chock full of examples, of industrial leaders from Science & Technology, Space Exploration, Transport, Vehicles, and Grid providers all giving their view of a future, a future of collaborations

Please visit the launch site here where it provides much of the different launch material from today’s event.

The need to replicate and learn

A real message was the ambition through Xcelerator is to replicate and learn, to gain from one set of experiences and challenges, in one industry, or a building or grid solution and scale that out, not so much a plug and play but a plug & run. The ability to optimise the end-to-end system value.

During the launch event, three parts of the transformation being undertaken were additionally announced.

• Launch of new Building X end-to-end smart building Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) suite
  • Planned acquisition of Brightly Software will accelerate growth in digital buildings complementing Siemens’ smart building portfolio
  • Partner ecosystem grows through industrial metaverse partnership with NVIDIA for physics-based, immersive digital twin development

New SaaS launch with Building X kicking this off

Siemens Smart Infrastructure has launched Building X, a new smart building suite that is open, interoperable and fully cloud-based. The suite is the first next-generation offering built on the design principles of Siemens Xcelerator, an open digital business platform launched today to accelerate digital transformation and value creation across industry, transportation, grids and buildings. The “X” stands for delivering these design principles of offering interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service.

Explaining Building X

Building X addresses the challenges of various stakeholders, including building users, investors, real estate companies and facility managers. It acts as a single source of truth to eliminate complexity and supports net-zero targets. Stakeholders can now digitize and use their building data from various sources, disciplines and systems on one single platform, Building X.

This enables a seamless user experience and the integration of their existing software and ecosystem, including third-party applications, through vendor-agnostic connectivity and open application programming interfaces (APIs). The suite offers modular, AI-enabled applications, and built-in cyber security. It also facilitates co-creation with customers and partners to address their challenges faster, thanks to the openness and cloud technology, which means digital transformation can be achieved easier, faster and at scale.

* I will pick up on this in a separate post as it brings to life the modular, scalable, open building suite that is designed to seamlessly integrate building systems to eliminate current complexity and enables the combination of sustainability goals and accelerating solutions to reach net-zero buildings.

Secondly, to build out Building X on Monday, June 27, 2022, Siemens announced the agreement to purchase Brightly Software, a leading U.S.-based asset and maintenance management software company. The acquisition will add Brightly‘s well-established capabilities across key sectors to Siemens’ digital and software know-how in buildings. It will be an additional core element of the Siemens Xcelerator for Buildings portfolio.

Thirdly a partnership announcement that continues to build out the Ecosystem network of Siemens with the announcement that with NVIDIA the plan is for a new era of immersive digital twin technology

Siemens will be making a considerable expansion to its Ecosystem of partners. It is committing significantly to joining forces and growing a strong partner ecosystem, building on existing strategic partnerships including Accenture, Atos, AWS, Bentley, Microsoft and SAP. The intention is to expand the partner ecosystem with multiple small, medium and large companies to solve problems by finding the right partnership solutions.

NVIDIA is the first major partnership agreement under the Siemens Xcelerator umbrella. The two companies today announced an expansion of their partnership to enable the industrial metaverse and increase the use of AI-driven digital twin technology that will help bring industrial automation to a new level. As the first step in this collaboration, the companies plan to connect Siemens Xcelerator, the open digital business platform and NVIDIA Omniverse, a platform for 3D design and collaboration. This will enable an industrial metaverse with physics-based digital models from Siemens and AI-enabled, physically accurate, real-time simulation from NVIDIA where companies make decisions faster and with increased confidence.

Here the ambition of building out the Industrial Metaverse begins to come to life. The power of having a digital twin to enable the real and virtual worlds to come together, to be simulated, to be tested, and designed before the actual real world. The exciting partnership offers a significant change to how the digital transformation will travel.

Picking up in the press release and within the event solutions for IIoT are building at a pace equally

A further part of the event mentions that Siemens also plans to integrate its industrial internet of things (IIoT) solutions for industry as Industrial Operations X, which brings together solutions and applications from the sensor to edge to cloud, IoT as-a-service and low code development capabilities, as well as a wide range of ready-to-use-apps. This will enable the fusion of data from the real world of automation with the digital world of information technology, enriched by Siemens’ comprehensive vertical IT/ OT integration knowledge and capabilities.

The key here, like all that Xcelerator is planning to do, finding solutions with partners that set about breaking down data silos and customer challenges to help companies to increase their performance, productivity, flexibility and sustainability. That alone is not a small deal it is the ability to enable faster innovation and value creation, to transform and why Xcelerator becomes the connector and power to enable the realization of Siemens being a focused technology company together in a thriving ecosystem of technology partners.

The beginning of a very different Siemens dawned today

The outcome for me is that today’s event begins the transformation of a very different business model for Siemens, one that moves from selling products to selling solutions and outcomes that the customer wants. If they want a box, product, or machine, then fine but if they want a complete solution then Siemens and its partners can find and offer the solution.

I want to absorb the multiple points of what was present here, it was arguable massive in ambition but so is the digital transition. Siemens has put a clear stake in the ground in transforming themselves and providing this Xcelerator platform that brings their portfolio (and others) around a growing Ecosystem and providing a growing marketplace of solutions, not products, to the challenges of making a step change within the industrial digital transformation

Please visit the Siemens site for all the different press releases relating to today’s event and this link to the specific launch page.

Disclaimer: This article is published in partnership with Siemens. Siemens is paying for my engagement, not for promotional purposes. Opinions are my own

The post Siemens launches Xcelerator for navigating the digital transformation first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

So, what makes industries more sustainable, more responsive and adaptive? How can we build a sustainable industrial capability?

We have entered a far more volatile set of market conditions. Industrial companies are searching for ways to accelerate their digital transformation to keep up with changing demands, managing the increasing complexity and reacting to supply chain challenges.

We are facing up to some of the most significant challenges of our time. Dealing with climate change, we urgently need to rapidly decarbonize in a world where the global industrial sector accounts for 20-30% of global carbon emissions and 1/3 of global energy use.

The imperative is transforming industry towards a greater need to build out a sustainable future as critical to tackling decarbonization in highly collaborative ways through the combination of technology and human ingenuity.

Today, there is a need to manage in a more highly connected, intelligent way through AI and machine learning and by connecting machines into a networked environment to harness the necessary data and intelligence to make more insightful decisions.

Energy efficiency and the need to focus on the aim to recycle are part of our solutions to change today’s environment. As we face a world of limited resources, the circular economy/resource efficiency needs a significant shift to promoting the reuse of materials.

So, what makes industries more sustainable, more responsive and adaptive? How can we build a sustainable industrial capability?

It is only genuinely digital enterprises that are open and prepared to work together in collaborative ecosystems that will be able to gain the flexibility, adaptiveness and capabilities, needing to work with fewer resources, more efficiently, faster and move towards a lower energy consumption that can move towards the required ambitions of becoming net-zero.

Sustainability is becoming central to making any significant transition. Siemens is focusing on being a sustainable industrial company in what it does itself in its solution offerings and with and for its partners and customers. A large part of achieving sustainability comes from applying targeted technologies.

Siemens AG is spending significant time providing sustainable innovations to drive this change. It is simply not just speeding up and scaling the available technology. It recognizes this has to be done in a radically different environment, in ecosystems working together to be the essential gamechanger to meeting and resolving these challenges.

Collaborating in ecosystems becomes critical to transitioning to a more sustainable industrial sector.

Siemens is empowering the industry through sustainable industrial innovation by providing technology designs that produce sustainable solutions.

Siemens is offering a sustainable digital enterprise portfolio, giving significant benefits of reducing cost and waste, managing business variability, and focusing on operational efficiency and optimization.

Equally, the potential for new business model innovation in the flexibility of design, re-engineering for reducing waste, recycling and recovery and testing through simulation, generative, and scenario investigations through applying their technology and software solutions.

 The power of connecting the real world with the digital world

Digitalization across the whole life cycle becomes critical when 80% of a product’s impact is determined at the design stage. Innovating more energy-efficient products can extend the life and be designed for reuse with a digital twin. Combining hardware and software can accelerate the transformation to a more sustainable future.

Recently at Hannover Messe 2022, Siemens showcased their portfolio through an e-mobility solution that combines the digital and physical worlds where design can be optimized and operations decarbonized, This showcase demonstrated the value of combining the digital and physical by using the digital twins for both product and production that efficiencies, optimization, simulation and the environmental footprint through a circular economy approach in design and material usage could all be addressed and proven.

Showcasing the SimRod- the fun electric roadster

In a panel discussion at Hannover Messe 2022 entitled “Transforming industries: Driving sustainability and profitability along the value chain” with Martin Kyburz, the CEO of Kyburz, Switzerland, Eryn Devola, the Head of Sustainability, Siemens Digital Industries, and Katrien Wyckaert, VP Strategy & Innovation, Simcenter Siemens Digital Industries Software they discussed challenges and solutions of the sustaining transformation by taking a deep dive into e-mobility by using the showcase “SimRod” as a technology carrier.

The SimRod is a roadworthy electric sports car that clearly demonstrates how Siemens is supporting and empowering the industry to design and produce sustainable products that are ecological in thinking and offer the lifecycle reuse potential which is increasingly expected today by the final customers.

The SimRod is a roadworthy all-electric sports car showing the result of the close collaboration with Siemens and Kyburz. This partnership between the two provided an exciting, fun, safe and compact all-electric car. A car designed to offer a good range of distance due to its design as lightweight design and delivering a quality of life return, and most importantly, specifically designed to be recycled

The Siemens solutions provided the empowering conditions to design and produce a sustainable product. The SimRod had its train, chassis, suspension, battery housing and design, and e-drive systems first simulated in the digital world, before creating any physical prototypes.

This digital design and simulation work allowed for a complete overview to optimize the design and led to identifying where additive solutions can help reduce cost and weight. Finally, harnessing all the data within this digital world gathered in digital design and testing enables a more efficient physical optimization of the car and the production design in producing a car optimized in its final configuration.

Transforming Industry for a Sustainable Future.

Applying Siemens technologies, the solutions can transform automotive products. Using solutions ranging from digital twins and additive manufacturing to automatic guided vehicles – achieving ergonomic designs in factory and production layouts providing more efficient and sustainable solutions by optimizing this in a simulated environment.

Applying this sustainable digital enterprise approach to both the product and production cycle enabled a more explicit ability to manage and engineer for the circular economy.

This showcase provided a significant proof of reference and validation in the design and simulation of the entire Siemens portfolio and strength with a single technology carrier- the SimRod providing what the unique combination of real & digital worlds do to become the catalyst for a Digital Enterprise that drives and integrates sustainability. The SimRod provided the collaboration capabilities by demonstrating technology and engaging suppliers, partners and the people involved in the design and production process.

Drawn from the Siemens Digital Enterprise portfolio was the application of the power of the Digital Twin, with the ability to accelerate product design and development, applying software and systems engineering. This approach allowed for building on Siemens approaches to Smart Manufacturing, Autonomous Production, Additive Manufacturing, IoT & Analytics, Sustainable & Flexible Production, offering Cyber Security, Energy Data Optimization, Product Carbon Footprint management with SiGREEN, and providing advice through Siemens Digital Services.

Siemens is a highly focused technology company that offers solutions ready for sustainability to meet industry challenges. Siemens fully supports the sustainable industrial innovation pathway alongside its customers with its solutions in highly collaborative environments. With the combination of digitalization, automation and the intelligent use of data, customers are equally having the opportunity of becoming Digital Enterprises, enabling them to become more resource-efficient, move towards decarbonizing and apply sustainable solutions to stimulate the circular economy

Disclaimer: This article is published in partnership with Siemens. Siemens is paying for my engagement, not for promotional purposes. Opinions are my own.

The post Building the sustainable industrial innovation pathway first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

As digital twins become critically important, entities are beginning to adopt this “twinning” concept dramatically, and within the Energy Transition we are undertaking, it will be no different.

A digital twin enables a Utility, for example, to visualize its assets, track the constant changes occurring consistently, and make better decisions on the performance optimization.

Wikipedia offers a useful clarification of the Digital Twin.

“A digital twin is a digital replica of a living or non-living physical entity. By bridging the physical and the virtual world, data is transmitted seamlessly, allowing the virtual entity to exist simultaneously with the physical entity.

Digital twin refers to a digital replica of potential and actual physical assets (physical twin), processes, people, places, systems, and devices that can be used for various purposes.

The digital representation provides both the elements and the dynamics of how an Internet of things device operates and lives throughout its life cycle. Digital twins integrate the internet of things, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and software analytics with spatial network graphs to create living digital simulation models that update and change as their physical counterparts change.”

As the energy transition is presently undergoing such radical changes, the managing of energy and especially grid management is getting highly complex and the digitalization of this is becoming vital to manage differently. Why?

There are major shifts required from the Utilities. These are from central one source energy systems to ones being based more on distributed energy. There is the influx of different energy sources for how electricity will be generated, mixing renewables (wind, solar) that have higher variance in supply, coupled with traditional energy resources (oil, gas, coal).

These energy alternatives are adding to the complexity of sourcing supply, pricing, and managing this mix as it enters and flows through the grid. The diversity of grid models, the ability to offer more attractive business models to enable the consumer to participate in managing their own energy, is also adding increased complexity.

Most utilities do not have one single data source domain. Planning, operations, tracking and evaluating asset management performance, and knowing outage management, all increasingly in real-time, needs a significant re-think over any digitalization and data management as anything less than one source of data is going to be increasingly difficult to manage effectively, to operate in a changing energy market place.

Today, many utilities have real problems synchronizing data as the multiple systems that have evolved often have different data formats, are designed for specific needs, and have often separate teams to maintain the data. These are increasingly creating data silo’s and limited visibility within the total system and can have significant risks of inconsistencies within them. So many have legacy lag.

Often these (sub-optima)l systems cannot accommodate data exchanges, and a growing consequence is declining efficiency and effectiveness to manage the complete grid and potential data losses, vulnerability over data, and asset attack can build without some resolve to radically adopt a different approach.

The increasing need is to change the operating environment, and the electrical digital twin can be the solution to prove a migration of systems and move towards one single data source. Synchronizing data exchanges, being able to have scalable data collection and storage (most probably in the cloud) becomes the new base point of necessity.

Building a comprehensive exchange network data model, within and beyond one company, allows for growing intelligence and understanding.

The incentive to move towards one transmission network model management system offers integration cost reductions; it can eliminate duplicated modeling efforts and can open up the ability to plan for alternative scenarios for predictive maintenance, anticipated grid balancing, anticipating different demand options, etc.

Electricity Digital Twins to build are “no walk in the park.” They have deployment challenges, addressing existing system complexity and require a very different level of skilled talent and workforce to manage any integration and harmonization of the current systems and manage these in the future in totally different ways.

If you can imagine bringing all assets into the digital twin of power plants, transmission and distribution lines, substations, and a growing end-use energy device network are incredibly complicated to transition.

So why do utilities need to undertake this radical overhaul of their existing systems?

When power systems are undergoing a transition from a centralized generation system to a new one that embraces new and emerging distributed ones, the data systems need equally revising. The significant shift in our energy system designs is placing demands on continually shifting between past-traditional energy sources into new decarbonized energy technologies.

The result is, of so much change occurring in the energy system there is a need for increased visibility in tracking, sourcing, adapting, and scaling, a constant ongoing ‘blending and adapting’ to keep pace with such dramatic changes being undertaken.

The digital twin, over time, will transform how and where energy is drawn down from; in options, availability, and requirements to optimize pricing. A digital twin can help determine how electricity is delivered in optimized ways and then offer variance on different business models and pricing packages to how energy can be consumed.

The aim is to increasingly provide reliable, affordable, and sustainable electric power to factories, businesses, communities. Equally to ensure the environment has clear visibility of where this energy derives from, how it is delivered in considering options and always dynamic in its attractiveness, to extract ‘best’ value for the Utility and the end-user.

These new market dynamics require a fully integrated system of physical and data operating in real-time to optimize this.

Different audiences, different needs

The Electrical Digital Twin needs to cater to the Engineer tasked with asset management, the Operations management to plan, schedule, and direct energy loads and to offer increased data understanding to all the suppliers and end-users for them to manage their part of the Network configuration.

A digital twin needs to offer increasingly immersive visualization, offer a three or four-D timeline of change occurring, account for building its history and tracking undertaking, contracts, and decision-making process for regulatory and performance evaluation.

A new digital system needs to offer analytics that enables different ‘what if’ views to be undertaken to anticipate and optimize decisions. Any digital system has to work towards constructing an end to end (E2E) of planning, simulation and engineering needs, the operations and control, and the understanding of consumption and usage.

Any digital modeling system needs to accommodate a considerable design of workflows. Not just in asset performance, in providing risk-based reliability testing strategies, planning maintenance and shutdowns, as well as verify in simulations before actual execution to assess the impact and offer alternative options to consider. The ability to capture real-time data can test reality capture, site assessment needs, and grid resilience.

A robust digitalization structure can enable protection, understand power flows, provide predictive analysis as well as simulate logistics, progress, status checks, and offer stakeholder engagements in collaborations or inspection.

Today, a number of the significant suppliers of energy solutions all working towards offering comprehensive electrical digital systems. Included are GE, Siemens, ABB, Emerson, AVEVA, Bentley, and increasingly Autodesk, SAP, Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, and Schneider Electric, among others. Each is offering specific parts of a solution or full solutions with the future aim of these being aligned and integrated into other systems that might be legacy or through preferred suppliers.

The Electrical Digital Twin market will grow substantially in the next few years as Utilities recognize the absolute need to change their existing operating and system models. The shift is as dramatic as the one undertaken in transitioning in energy sourcing and in the implications of implementing the asset changes that this brings into the energy system.

The future digital system needs to be technology ready.

Having a system that can analyze, predict, optimize current and future demands on the networks is essential. Having one system-wide view of your assets and data will have a significant impact on the ability to gain from machine learning and AI in the future. The pressures are building on all utilities in deploying a fully integrated, connected-up network to offer reliable, low-cost, and sustainable energy in a rapidly transforming energy world.

The Electrical Digital Twin market will grow substantially in the next few years as Utilities recognize the absolute need to change their existing operating and system models. The shift is as dramatic as the one undertaken in transitioning in energy sourcing and in the implications of implementing the asset changes that this brings into the energy system.

Both the physical and digital system changes need to be undertaken without delay. Otherwise, the complexity within the energy transitions being initiated will overwhelm those that stay locked into the present.

The post The Need for an Electrical Digital Twin first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

I downloaded a paper, written by Geoff Hollingworth, Head of Ericsson Cloud Marketing, Ericsson Evangelist, in collaboration with Jason Hoffman, Head of Product Area Cloud Infrastructure, Ericsson last year called “The Zero Distance World”

I came across it again this week, as I was busy re-organizing my files and references and I wanted to share parts of it, in quotes that I feel are fairly powerful

On checking, I saw that Geoff Hollingsworth has left Ericsson and when I went in search of this paper I got the message back “Page Requested, Cannot Be Found“. Annoying but let me press on and draw out some things that held my attention and why I am posting some of the points made.

Firstly we are often are told it is becoming a “zero-sum game” and so this “Zero Distance world” made me curious. So let me “pull out some points that I think resonate for me and hopefully for you.

Quote One:

“Everything exists for a reason. But most of the time we have forgotten what that reason is. To re-invent your business, you need to start with the “why” of what you do and only then consider the “how”. An opening quote from Garrett, R., (2015)
“The 10 Steps of Emotion Processing”

Quote Two:

“Distance and time are being destroyed, and we now have a total reach to both people and machines. Products (and people) that are not connected will be orphans of a cruel world if they aren’t already. Welcome to the zero distance world”

Quote Three:

“We need to start by understanding that change is moving from human to machine, from prescriptive to learning. And
then we need to understand the combined powers these enabling technologies (mobile, broadband, cloud) have on all existing systems. Yet these technologies are also not fixed. They are becoming ever more capable, at a fraction of the old price”. Quote from Desjardins, J., (2017) “Bitcoin was the best performing currency of both 2015 and 2016”, Business Insider

Quote Four:

“Preparing for a zero distance world and ever-accelerating change. This is what this paper is about – preparing for a world
of zero distance and ever-accelerating change. It primarily focuses on businesses and technology, but without forgetting individuals, societies, countries and the world at large”.

Quote Five:

“We have three main messages for people and companies that want to succeed:
1. Re-find who you are (soul)
2. Learn the new ways of winning (mind)
3. Become a digital machine (body)”

The 10 steps of emotional processing applied to digital- what really caught my attention

“The 10 Steps of Emotion Processing” [reference comes from Pair A Docks].
The 10 steps are as follows:
1. We consciously observe what we experience
2. On reflection, we notice what we did not consciously see
3. We recognize new patterns
4. We acknowledge their effects
5. We accept the consequences
6. We own what it means for us
7. We appreciate the impact to us
8. We understand what we need to understand
9. We build process to enable the adoption of the new future
10. We reframe our perspective going forward

Pair A Docks view of the different steps is:

1) Observe: Look at, watch, listen to; staying with it.

2) Notice: See, hear and sense; perceive.

3) Recognize … discern what it is in a known (previously identified) pattern.

4) Acknowledge: Be with its “is-ness,” “actual-ness,” “there-ness,” existence; synonyms: concede, grant, admit, confess.

5) Accept … that it is and align with it… noticing and rejecting any judgment or evaluation according to conscious or unconscious beliefs, ideals, rules, requirements, etc.

6) Own … what is happening in you; take responsibility for.

7) Appreciate: Be fully conscious of, aware of, detect; synonyms: esteem, prize, value; exercise wise judgment, delicate perception, keen insight.

8) Understand: Perceive the meaning of, grasp the idea of, comprehend; grasp the significance, implications, importance of, regard as firmly communicated.

9) Intercept: Feel the sensations in the body.

10) Digest: Process, metabolize, break down and discharge.

This was interpreted for this paper to bring these steps into the Business world

1  Observe –  New leaders are behind big changes, using new rules and winning
2  Notice –  The results are transformational, economically and disruptive
3  Recognize – Connected everything creates data to feed machines to augment human effectiveness and reach
4  Acknowledge –  This forces all companies to ask their “Why” question
5  Accept – And then accept the need to change
6  Own –  Where a new approach to digital is required
7  Appreciate – With next-generation digital economics
8  Understand– – New best practices are required
9  Process – And safe change requires discipline
10 Reframe – Finally accept the need to embrace, accept, and start observing again is reflected on the outside

Quote Six:

“The current transformation, the one of replacing physical with digital, is exceptionally powerful because it destroys distance rather than accommodating it. The zero distance world challenges all previous systems, even ones that have worked so well that we no longer question their existence”

Quote Seven:

“These companies (that) have operational models that capture an exponential capability increase but with linear costs and an exponential price decrease, all while maintaining value. They achieve such efficiency by removing what is not necessary and simplifying what must be there. By aggressively standardizing across all facilities, infrastructure, operations and business lines, high revenue per employee statistics become obvious rather than surprising.”

Quote Eight:

“The ones that can translate this tsunami of data into insight and action will have a massive advantage over those that cannot. And the ones that can do it the fastest will win outright. You have to ask: What will be the acceptable delay between request (need) and response (offer) in the future?”

Quote Nine:

“Building business models focused on new outcomes Next-generation digital requires the destruction of this existing entropy….From a business-model perspective, companies are moving from a focus on product to product and services, to pro-active customer support, to completely new outcomes”

Quote Ten:

“Future digital will require precision control from the edge to the core and from private to public. Can you imagine what your digital operations are going to look like? Probably not”.

Quote Eleven:

“The future requires a new kind of digital operation and infrastructure. This will be cloud-based since this is the most efficient and agile approach. However, cloud-based can mean a lot of different things. Today AWS public cloud has a very different economic performance from the results seen in the private domain. But this will change, as tomorrow both public and private cloud will be forced to deliver the same high performance economic in one seamless operation from edge to core”

Quote Twelve:

” Moving further out, it then becomes clear that – thanks to automation and developments in robotics – products will no longer need to be designed for use by humans, from the latches fastening servers in racks to all the safety features. The Ericsson and Intel “Future Digital Infrastructure” is an example of such a possible design [ref]. And if the designs are self-contained, perhaps they do not need dedicated real estate but can be integrated into existing infrastructure”

Finally, (for me), “In a zero distance world, precision control is a requirement enabled by real-time data-driven decisions. This need for precision control applies across the total business, including:

• Procurement
• Design
• Lifecycle management
• Operations to support
• Application deployment
• Application management
• Real-time TCO calculation.

This drives a continually improving industrialization cycle.

At Ericsson, this paper rightly informs me that they manage large-scale industry transformations with clients who cannot afford unknowns and/or failures and projecting way out into the future on what they are building and working on. I need to come back and focus on them for more digital and platform informing.

The paper comes to a view that has left me some thinking as my summary

“It is important, in this context, to adopt the new technology but never to value innovation over discipline. Cloud may be the most efficient and agile infrastructure and operating model to date. However, the cloud is a cost unless people, competence, process and automation tools exist to enable discipline. A diligent process must be followed that is not driven by technology, but by continuous business KPI’s and wanted customer experience.”

***I would differ on this point, discipline works up to a point, it is the ingenuity found when looking for value in innovation that trumps this but both need to be diligent and keeping alert to this essential customer need, not just experience.

So back to what this paper has as three main messages for businesses.

• Re-find who you are (soul)
• Learn the new ways of winning (mind)
• Become a digital machine (body)

“The first message touches the soul of a company. The second message drives home the need to understand the new rulebook for winning. And the third message is about building a next-generation business engine, a digital machine that delivers on the promise of the first two messages”.

It is somewhat annoying this paper does not seem to be readily available, it has some terrific messages of how digital is giving us this “the zero distance world” where we need to prepare for such major changes.

I just can’t find the paper on their site, so to provide a link to a direct PDF download Ericsson_Cloud_Zero-Distance-World paper, that is if you want to read it all.

The paper is a timely reminder to me to go back and spend more time on appreciating the contributions that Ericsson and their digital services bring besides a thought-provoking paper buried somewhere within their portal that offers some great quotes to reflect over.

BTW, I do not work or get paid for this, I just think the quotes extracted as stimulating and useful to share.

The post Being Reminded We Are In A Zero Distance World first appeared on Your Ecosystem Design Hub.

Specifically, the platform business model has been generating a significant dynamism that is hard to ignore recently. We are increasingly in need to scale as quickly as possible and by moving to the emphasis of platform capacity, helps this considerably.

Platforms require networks and the need to build ecosystems and the whole focus is on increasing engagement, or build this “capacity”. Connecting all this up can provide real scale. Building greater capacity, especially without adding to resources yields a greater return.

I feel the way we presently view scale, one presently linked far more to one single entity, one that is wanting to scale up their business model and that limits opportunities. I feel searching for new ‘capacity’ opens this up and takes us more towards the open, collaborative platform business model, where real growth seems to reside for our business futures.

The digital platform is fast becoming the most powerful driver of innovation.

The digital platform allows through this capacity building to seek out productivity and collaborations. A platform only works in the ability to engage and build activity and momentum. They increasingly lend themselves to searching for a more radical innovation design. They can deliver more tailored made solutions in new products and services that combine multiple parties expertise to deliver a greater complexity in new bundles and combinations that meet that increasing need to “cut across” previous stand-alone sectors.

We can see this “platform effect” in Uber, TripAdvisor, Airbnb that offer increased transparency, comparison and build new combined services, these new bundles and combinations that make customer engagement easier to complete a whole journey or holiday “package” through the connected platform providers and their ecosystem of partners.

Also we see platforms constantly collapsing down transaction costs due to this ability to compare and be more transparent, allowing for consumers to have more ‘informed’ choices. This has then forced more efficiencies out of the system. Supply chains have become more focused on productivity and focused activities. Specialised have become more focused on offering a clear expertise in a given service. The industrial platform (B2B) is catching up on its business-to-consumer (B2C) digital sibling.

Platforms are economic drivers

Platforms are achieving different levels of penetration than before, you have the connection in your hand, they give customer benefits in this connected world, delivered on the platform and in new ways of innovating products and services, that allow you to “tailor and build” your solutions to your specific needs. We achieve greater convenience, choice, assortment and pricing comparison.

Platforms have become aggregators of supply and demand, this two-sided platform solution where demand and supply need to have a clear focus on any business platform solution. They work on reducing frictions, increasing choices, adding greater flexibility of timing, choice and solution combinations.

Risks, transaction costs, information gathering, negotiation and communications all change within good business platform models to become more effective at managing the process or transaction.

Lastly, the capacity within platforms allows for a more dynamic growth with lower marginal additional costs.

Of course, platforms are based on technology, lots of it.

The more superior application and solution, the ability to exponentially grow demand become critical. The attraction of one platform over another is determined by the dynamics of the technology solutions. It is this focusing on technology solutions is where one platform provider scores over the other.

This is such a growing area of my focus. The application of digital solutions through technology, ones that are powering innovation and our economic growth.

I came across this visual from a Roland Berger report on the state of platforms in Europe. It states a platform business is far superior to many of today’s traditional business models focused on “just” physical goods. If you are searching for growth today it has to be based on the Network Revolution, as they nicely put it.  Just look at this:

Understand and work out how the new market dynamics will grow your business and that is digitally

If you are not designing technology solutions, focusing on increasing your provision of services or working within coordinated networks no wonder your business is stagnant or declining, if not today then certainly real soon.

Innovation has such a high component of digital in the final solutions we are offering. Today our knowledge feeds innovation, digital feeds our knowledge, in our access to it and making the connected understanding as part of our solution designs.

All I can urge you to do is get into platform understanding, which works for you, which offers the greater potential, which allows you to connect up and build greater innovative offerings by recognizing working alone is the path to oblivion.

It is through collaboration and digital solutions you have a chance to redesign your business and make the connections with the consumer or your customers, who are all increasingly raising their expectations, wanting solutions that are fitting their lifestyle or business needs, so they can extract more and that is through digitally connected solutions.

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