How Business Intelligence, Digital Transformation and the Cloud Enable the Most Successful New Business Models
A few thousand Oracle users, partners, and employees sat (and stood, as necessary) at Mandalay Bay, waiting for that day’s keynote to begin. 
The CIO of Oracle, Mark Sunday, was scheduled to give us the latest buzz on cloud computing. A guitar riff rang through the hall, and as the sounds of AC/DC’s 1980 tune “Back in Black” disrupted the calm, he took the stage. Within a few minutes, though, the blast from the past turned into a look at the future of business.
To highlight the startling impact of digital disruption today, Sunday began by quoting Tom Goodwin‘s recent Techcrunch article, demonstrating that customer experience can be an asset more valuable than physical resources or intellectual property in many industries.
“Uber, the world’s largest taxi company, owns no vehicles. Facebook, the world’s most popular media owner, creates no content. Alibaba, the most valuable retailer, has no inventory. And Airbnb, the world’s largest accommodation provider, owns no real estate.”
With Goodwin’s assertion that the current battle is for the customer interface, let’s look at a few key points from Mark Sunday about the roles of business intelligence and the cloud in facing this challenge.
1. “Consumption of innovation” drives success in the cloud. Corporate buying sprees continue, sometimes for the time-tested reasons of synergy, supply chain, or market penetration. In the 2010s, though, simply acquiring and adapting resources and technology hasn’t driven growth in many cases, but acquiring with the goal of innovation has. Without an innovative focus, the firm’s CX can’t advance and compete with the new disruptors.
2. “96% of consumers receive irrelevant ads and promotions.” Of course, the question isn’t whether you are in the 4% or the larger group, it’s where your customers fall. The companies of the future are using the cloud to understand and influence the customer experience at every step of the process, and the market leaders have won the buyer’s business before he or she arrives at an ecommerce site.
3. When it comes to building your organization, “Engage candidates for future needs.” According to Sunday, organizations have never found it harder to acquire the talent they need. Instead of just recruiting for jobs, the companies of the future will use cloud-based business intelligence to build connections, strengthen relationships, and make onboarding seamless. Human capital management cloud, including analytics, will drive modern HR.
So what are the next steps? Later, we’ll examine other intersections of customer experience and digital transformation, including benefits and best practices for cloud-based business intelligence.
