Business leaders are urgently trying to keep pace with the surge of digital transformation globally.

Frost & Sullivan senior partner Dorman Followwill told delegates at the Growth, Innovation and Leadership (GIL) Africa 2017 summit, in Cape Town, that the world was faced with a tidal wave of change. He said most leaders were in the “ostrich zone” and were wearing blinkers, with only around 15% embracing digital transformation.

He warned that closed business models belonged in the past.

“Open is the only way to go. Think Alibaba and Amazon, which are incredibly open models with great revenue potential.”

Followwill compared the iPhone, which he described as a “closed architecture system” with its network of iPhone stores and high prices, with Chinese company Xiaomi – one of the world’s largest smartphone makers. He said the increasingly popular Xiaomi spent very little on marketing, relying on social media and word of mouth.

Frost & Sullivan also foresees big changes in education.

“Instead of training people [in terms of] what to think, we need to train people how to think,” said Followwill, who added that there was already a sharp move away from conventional education, as demonstrated by the 2.2-million children being home-schooled in the US.

Digital Health
Followwill also focused on health issues, stating that the world was entering the era of the “power patient”, in which people have the power in health, with ‘Dr Google’ becoming commonplace.

“Google is huge. People have the power. We can look at ecomedicine, nanomedicine, self-care and pre-emptive medicine and can create networks around this that are amazing.” He said online support communities were booming.

But digital transformation also had a downside, which surfaced in everything from fake news to mobile phone addiction, shown in a recent survey in the US.

“We don’t have teenagers. We have screenagers. Fifty per cent of teens are addicted to mobile phones.”

Nevertheless, Followwill said that, despite major threats, there were huge opportunities, including open model opportunities for ecommerce, expanding home education platforms and developing apps to train people how to think for themselves.

Leveraging technology for the good of people would be vital. He said Google, Alibaba and Amazon had performed well in this space, while Uber, Fox News and United Airlines had failed recently.

“You can’t drag people off planes and think you won’t get noticed.”

In a world of rising digital transformation, Followwill said there was also a huge market for personal freedom, with an opportunity to create signal-free zones, where people could unplug from the digital world.