Digital Strategy

Thanks to a variety of trends and technologies in the private (social media, smart home, mobile internet…) and business environments (3D printing, advanced robotics, machine learning, etc.), the phenomenon of digitalisation has long been an influential one. The digital change can be felt in both our private and professional lives, and is gaining momentum with enormous speed.

Figure 1: Examples of disruptive technologies over the course of time

In regard to the expectations associated with digital change, there is a great deal of uncertainty: projections for the future range from substantial opportunities to existential risks. Against this background,  “digitalisation” has thus far been viewed by companies as a means of increasing efficiency. However, the structural changes associated with technological progress have an impact far beyond this. Within the framework of digital change, it is the intelligent, global networking of market participants (people, things and machines), in particular, that represents an explosive mix with the potential to significantly alter or even break up existing value chains and established business models. As such, we can understand digitalisation and the resulting digital change as part of the holistic shift to a new digital economy. The associated digital transformation uses technological advances to develop innovative value chains and business models. In the sense of Schumpeter’s “creative destruction”, this leads to the aforementioned disruption of established value chain structures and business models. Examples of such digital disruption are:

Figure 2: Examples of disruptive business models

The examples illustrate how modern technologies can exploit unused resources and be transferred into new digital business models in combination with the corresponding customer benefits. Case studies for the entry of such dynamic, digitally-oriented market participants can be found in almost all industries. As a consequence, pressure is increasing on the old brick-and-mortar “top dogs” to find their own answers to the challenges of digital change.

One particularly expansive and multifaceted example is the Amazon ecosystem.

Figure 3: Amazon as an example of a disruptive ecosystem

As can be seen in Figure 3, the Amazon ecosystem extends into many areas and includes both private (B2C) and business (B2B) offerings. Furthermore, media content, hardware and the marketing of these are all included in the ecosystem. This results in disruption by Amazon on a wide variety of fronts and across a diverse range of sectors.

Against the backdrop of the wide-ranging opportunities and risks of the digital economy and the associated digital transformation, the field of digital strategy focuses on the following areas:

• (Disruptive) Business Model Development: Development of (disruptive) business models in line with the needs of customers and with overall economic profitability
• Digital Disruption Health Check: Environment analysis of the extent to which there is a risk of digital disruption of the value chain and the business model by new dynamic, digital-savvy market participants
• Digital Readiness: The creation of a comparative competitive analysis using specific evaluation criteria for digitalisation maturity in regard to strategy, organisation, customers, competitors and technology
• Digital Transformation Strategy: The creation of an individual roadmap for the systematic digital transformation of your company in line with specific stages of digital evolution
• Performance Improvement via Digitalisation: Use of digital tools to reduce costs and increase efficiency in the value chain
• Digital Operational Excellence: Analysis of the operational optimisation potential according to a digital transformation strategy and derivation of a roadmap with corresponding measures
• Digital Turnaround: Digital turnaround means immediately identifying and implementing effective measures so that the company can successfully master crises
• Lean Digitalisation of White-Collar: Maximising efficiency in indirect areas through lean digitisation
• NFT Strategy: Use cases to cover various steps of the value chain, from manufacturing a physical product to verifying product authenticity to storing unlimited product- or service-related data
• Big Data Analytics: Identify strategically relevant aspects of big data and analytics and prioritise them according to their value contribution to the company