Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have seen a “digital divide” emerge, where companies that invested in digital before 2020 were able to progress through the stages of disruption (business continuity, cost containment, etc.) to the next phase of growth. Digital transformation was accelerated by the need for remote work and collaboration with internal and external constituents, and those companies that had previously implemented DX initiatives prior to the pandemic were, and continue to be, able to respond more flexibly.
Another component of digital transformation that evolved rapidly during the pandemic is the evolution of industry ecosystems, from a static list of partners that provide supply or support occasionally to a diverse, flexible, and scalable mix of technology vendors, industry organizations, industry consortia, supply chains, service providers, service and expert networks, and the end customer.
Organizations from every industry, including manufacturing, healthcare, retail, financial services, government, and construction, continue to expand and evolve the way that they work with industry ecosystem partners. Traditional value chains are now open, iterative closed loops between a varied set of partners from inside and outside these organizations — including within and outside their industry. Working more closely with industry ecosystem partners is necessary, as our 2021 Future of Industry Ecosystems Global Survey shows, to spark innovation; augment skills, capacity, and knowledge; and enable resiliency.
Examples exist today of companies, friend and foe, working together in tandem to share data and insights, share applications, and share operations and expertise, and deliver products, services, and experiences, in a blended physical and digital way to the end patient, citizen, customer, or consumer.
IDC’s Top 10 Future of Industry Ecosystems predictions
Prediction 1: By 2022, organizations that share data, applications, and operations with their industry ecosystem will realize a revenue increase of 3 percentage points higher than nonparticipants.
Prediction 2: By 2024, 80% of industry ecosystem orchestrators will mandate a uniform ESG policy for industry ecosystem participants through a governance platform and applications for initial and ongoing verification.
Prediction 3: By 2023, 60% of industry ecosystems will establish open innovation hubs for cross-industry collaboration, shared application development, personalized customer engagement, and 5% YoY participant growth.
Prediction 4: By 2025, 80% of industry ecosystem participants will leverage their own product, asset, and process digital twins to share data and insight with other participants.
Prediction 5: By 2026, 25% of the new application portfolio of global and local public, private, and nonprofit organizations will consist of consortia-developed applications within their industry ecosystem.
Prediction 6: By 2025, blockchain will find its killer application with industry ecosystems, as 80% of Global 2000 organizations use distributed ledgers in their ecosystem initiatives to establish and assure trust.
Prediction 7: By 2022, 50% of the Fortune 500 will manage the value of shared ecosystem data via KPIs of improved operational productivity, ongoing customer engagement, and skills enhancement.
Prediction 8: By 2023, 25% of industry organizations will utilize venture capital subsidiaries and funding from industry partners to accelerate ecosystem scale, finance green initiatives, and spark new innovation.
Prediction 9: By 2024, 50% of federal governments will take an active role in industry ecosystem development, scale, and support through legislation, financing, security, and digital and physical infrastructure.
Prediction 10: By 2026, on average, 30% of Global 2000 company revenue will derive from industry ecosystem shared data, applications, and operations initiatives with partners, industry entities, and business networks.
Interested in learning more? Watch our webinar, IDC FutureScape: Worldwide Future of Industry Ecosystems 2022 Predictions.
