The FINANCIAL — Canadian companies have a leading edge over other countries when it comes to the adoption of mobile technology, but an increase in senior executive sponsorship is required to enable Canadian companies to become major disruptors among their competitors, the Accenture Mobility Insights Report 2014 found.
Almost all Canadian enterprise respondents (85 percent) have effectively adopted and deployed mobile technologies, markedly higher than the average global response of 69 percent among 14 other countries surveyed. Despite this, there is an opportunity for Canadian organizations to leapfrog international competitors, as currently less than one-third (31 percent) of Canadian respondents reported that their chief executive is directly involved in mobility strategy, slightly lower than the global average of 35 percent, according to Accenture.
“To stay competitive and become digital disruptors in industries that have gone through years of disruption from new entrants, CEOs need to become more engaged in creating and implementing their digital strategies with their IT teams,” said Stephen Gardiner, Managing Director of Accenture Digital, Canada. “The entire business strategy must be fully aligned and integrated in order to take advantage of digital technologies, including continuing the strategic shift to mobile that Canadian businesses are doing so well at. Mobile, cloud, social and analytics are rapidly – and permanently – transforming industries. Every business is now a digital business, and leaders who understand this and use it to capitalize on the benefits of digital are most likely to succeed in the long term,” he added.
The impact on businesses in Canada from the convergence of digital technologies is significant, as 26 percent expect to generate additional revenue; 25 percent plan to build entirely new digital businesses or services, and 29 percent expect to penetrate new markets altogether.
When asked to consider their investments in digital technologies, more than half (56 percent) of Canadian respondents named mobility in their top two priorities – significantly higher than the global result of 43 percent, according to Accenture.
Specifically, the top mobile priorities for Canadian businesses are to drive revenue through customer engagement on mobile devices (57 percent); drive revenue through transactions on mobile devices (48 percent); improve field service/ customer service delivery with instant data access, capture, and processing (40 percent); and open new sales or marketing channels (38 percent).
To date in Canada, strategic, organizational and operational challenges have made it difficult for companies to take full advantage of mobility’s promise. Seven in 10 struggle to keep pace with new mobile devices and systems – in line with global results, says Accenture report.
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