Tan Jee Toon, IBM Viet Nam’s country general director spoke about digital transformation at the meeting. — Photo courtesy of IBM Viet Nam

Digital transformation is shifting towards a new chapter – Chapter 2 – ending experimentation with artificial intelligence (AI) and moving simple workloads to the cloud at many organisations, said Tan Jee Toon, IBM Viet Nam’s country general director.

Speaking at a meeting held in Ha Noi on Wednesday, he said as emerging technologies such as AI, automation, Internet of Things (IoT) and blockchain become pervasive, their combined impact has started reshaping standard business and technology architectures. There is a clear demand from many organisations to be fully digital and be able to accommodate high client expectations and deal with pervasive interconnectivity.

Chapter 2 is about moving from experimentation to true transformation, gaining speed and scale in digital transformation. There are three core critical areas for businesses on the path to Chapter 2. Firstly, it is digital and AI. Business are pursuing two distinct approaches to digital transformation including outside-in and inside-out.

“There can’t be AI without IA (information architecture). This is because companies need a business platform to connect all their digital services and manage the lifecycle of their AI apps,” said Le Nhan Tam, Chief Technology Officer at IBM Viet Nam.

Secondly, to achieve real digital transformation, organisations need a hybrid agile cloud infrastructure, which is open, secure and managed, allowing them to seamlessly use private, public and multi cloud environments, flexibly as needed, to host and run AI and other solutions including automation, analytics and blockchain. Chapter 2 is about scaling AI and creating hybrid clouds.

Companies today are around 10-20 per cent into their cloud journey. Their initial forays in Chapter 1 have focused on renting computer power at scale, to drive cost and productivity efficiency. The next 80 per cent of the cloud opportunity focuses on shifting business applications to the cloud and optimising everything from supply chains to sales.

Thirdly, responsible stewardship is a key pillar in Chapter 2. Businesses must ensure that clients’ data is secure, that clients retain control of their data and that they can trust AI technology and its recommendations. It is imperative to invest in equipping students and working professionals for a new generation of in-demand skills.

IBM commits to be the active digital transformation partner of Viet Nam by bringing its key technologies to analyse data and make useful insights for businesses in vertical sectors such as healthcare, automotive, retail, government, aviation, finance, banking and business solutions. — VNS