Digitization - How many years will your company survive?

Digitization will usher in a new era with a huge range of possibilities, opportunities and risks for companies. Investments to adapt to the digital transformation are a question of survival for companies if they want to stay competitive in the market. 

Online, you can find new solutions to old problems. By using new software solutions and business models, companies are gaining new customers by being able to offer better service, convenience and quality at a lower price. 

But why should companies change their way of doing things if they are successful? Successful companies need to keep up, otherwise they’ll be left behind. Resting on your laurels won’t bring you forward. 

Blockbuster and Blackberry are good examples for this. Both companies were market leaders in their businesses and lost their market share. They are not the only examples: record labels, TV channels, travel agencies, yellow pages, hotel chains, taxi companies, USB flash drive manufacturers, telecommunication operators and booksellers are being replaced by companies with new business models. 

Here are some examples:

• Spotify - a digital music service offering their users a legal way to stream over 16 million songs on their smartphones and PCs. You can’t buy the songs, only listen to them. For the premium version, the user pays a monthly fee and in return the account is advertising-free. However, there is advertising in the free version. This business model has shaken record labels.  
• Netflix - rents and produces movies and series. Since 2007, Netflix has offered video on demand to registered subscribers who can stream the content unlimitedly. Netflix has 104 millions subscribers worldwide, making it a huge competitor to video rental shops and TV channels. 
• Booking.com - and other online services are competing with travel agencies. The core business of those online services are reserving and booking hotel rooms. Booking.com has become the leading hotel booking platform worldwide with one million bookings a day. 
• Google - is the most visited website in the world and processes over 3 billion search requests a day. Formerly, you looked up telephone numbers and handyman in the yellow pages. Today, Google delivers a huge number of results and, in addition, reviews from other customers. 
• Airbnb – is a community marketplace for booking and renting accommodations. Private hosts rent out their home or parts of it to strangers on this platform. Tourists save money and the hosts make some extra money. Airbnb is a good alternative to hotels for many travellers. 
• Uber – is a technology platform on which you can find a cheap ride anytime and everywhere. The driver uses his own car to pick up guests and drives them to their destination. No reservation is needed. With the push of a button the nearest driver comes to pick-up the customer. Uber has become an alternative to taxis in many cities. 
• Cloud – describes the provision of IT infrastructures like data storage, processing power or software applications as services over the internet. At a later time, you can access the data with other devices. In the past, you had to save your data on a flash drive to transfer it to another device.
• Video platform - is an online service with which you can put your videos on the internet. Generally, the videos are uploaded by the producer and the users can stream them directly. The younger generations mainly watch videos on demand using those platforms and neglecting TV programs. 
• WhatsApp – a messaging service with which users can send short messages, images, videos, files, contacts, locations as well as make voice calls on smartphones. This service is mainly used for individual communication from one smartphone to another. Until WhatsApp was released, customers had used SMS via their telecommunication service providers to communicate with their relatives on the other side of the world. 
• Amazon – is an electronic commerce which has shaken the book retail market. Being the largest e-commerce on the internet, Amazon has the widest range of books, cds and videos worldwide. Through the integrated sales platform “marketplace”, private people and companies can also sell their new or used goods on Amazon.
• Facebook – is a social network which is, amongst other things, also used to distribute news. Young users use social media as an independent source of news. They are less interested in the news portals from publishing houses, because it seems easier to stay informed using social media. 

How many years will your company survive?

Market-leading companies who want to stay in the leading positing need to plan ahead and foresee their customer’s preferences. Innovation means to surprise your customers with services, and offer services and products that are completely new on the market. Your customers need to love these services and believe that they are everything they always wanted. 

In times of daily change, companies need to envision the future. Is your company developing a product or services for future generations or is it stuck being comfortable with its own success? How long will it be able to compete with the other, innovative companies?

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