SAP Italy is promoting, in collaboration with IDC, a study of Italian SMEs to understand the degree of capability in managing business functions with new technologies.
Five scenarios are analyzed in the research: Technology Platforms, Customer Experience, Smart Manufacturing, Smart HR, and Smart Procurement. Each of these requires investment and training to be truly functional for the business, understanding markets and new customer needs. SAP Italy involved 224 Italian companies in the study to understand their path to the Intelligent Enterprise. Among the most positive results is the growing awareness of how data is the real value-added to understanding the story of business reality and what it takes to act in real time to achieve better results.
SAP Italy encourages smart enterprise
Today’s technology solutions, Cloud, Big Data and High Performance Analytics require specialized platforms and new management practices. However, SMEs are beginning to incorporate these new growth tools within their strategic planning. Thus, the enterprise company model is working, scaling to even smaller but no less active entities on the ground and on international scenarios thanks in part to the Cloud. Indeed, this represents, for 40 percent of the companies surveyed, a powerful lever of digital transformation, enabling management simplification and scalability in the growth phase. Similarly, 54 percent of SMEs consider it strategic to analyze data to better define their customer experience strategy.
For SAP, the scenario is encouraging
If until a few years ago SMEs seemed stuck at the post, now a new and deeper understanding of technologies (cloud and data analytics) makes them open to change. Digital Transformation is thus seen as a weapon to overcome the economic crisis and not as a burden that aggravates on development. However, there is a need to train management and employees to first understand and then really take advantage of digital technologies.
