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VMware Blockchain for Ethereum HERO

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Banking on Experience: How Customers Are Revolutionizing Financial Services

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Modern Bank Heists 5.0: The Escalation from Dwell to Destruction

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Global Survey Ties Digital Investments to Growth, Business Resiliency During Pandemic

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Blockchain: What Business Leaders Really Need to Know

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How DBS Bank Makes People the Priority During a Pandemic

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After Accelerating Its Cloud Transformation, This Company Says There’s No Going Back

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NSE - the National Stock Exchange of India - shares how digital transformation helped keep it operational during the 2020 pandemic.

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At 4 Billion Financial Transactions a Day, Every Nanosecond Counts

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How Northern Trust Approaches App Modernization

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What the Pandemic’s Taught Us About Digital Transformation

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The Ethereum technology stack — from EVM, smart contracts, APIs, developer tools, and its overall ecosystem — is the broadest and most mature stack on which to build blockchain networks. Yet, there are several critical gaps Ethereum platforms have that make them difficult to use for enterprise use cases, such as lack of robust privacy and scalability for complex workloads, governance mechanisms, and enterprise-class operational support characteristics. To address these gaps, VMware is launching <a href="https://octo.vmware.com/author/blockchain/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">VMware Blockchain for Ethereum</a>, available now in beta.

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Blockchain technology provides a revolutionary business transformation opportunity for enterprises by allowing them to build distributed network ecosystems, multi-party applications, and digital asset experiences. The beta release of VMware Blockchain for Ethereum builds upon VMware’s enterprise blockchain platform for businesses to easily build, efficiently operate, and quickly scale Ethereum-based blockchain networks. It also gives customers flexibility and choice by adding Ethereum support in addition to its existing support for the Daml smart contract language.

“Over the last several years, we have seen application architectures evolve from being monolithic to being distributed,” said Kit Colbert, VMware CTO. “We are on the cusp of a new evolution in application architecture: decentralized applications running on blockchains that will power new multi-party workflows. To enable our enterprise customers to capitalize on this evolution, we are building VMware Blockchain for Ethereum, the first enterprise-focused Ethereum stack with integrated privacy-preserving functionality. We are proud to have the Bank of Israel and Infosys as early adopters of the technology<em>.”</em>

Built for enterprise use cases, VMware Blockchain for Ethereum is an EVM compatible platform that will provide high throughput performance, unique ZKP-based programmable privacy capabilities, enterprise-grade operations, and governance features. The beta will support standard Ethereum APIs, commonly used development tools such as Truffle, Hardhat and Remix, and wallets like MetaMask to enable a seamless developer experience. To get started quickly, Solidity developers can deploy the new VMware Blockchain for Ethereum Developer Kit on their local machine in addition to vSphere and AWS cloud environments.

Since its launch in 2020, <a href="https://www.vmware.com/products/blockchain.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">VMware Blockchain</a> has provided a digital foundation customers like ASX and Broadbridge trust to power multi-party ecosystems that generate new revenue, increase efficiency and maintain a competitive edge.

The Bank of Israel is among the first customers to co-innovate with VMware Blockchain’s privacy-preserving functionality in a recent assessment of technologies for its Digital Shekel Project or CBDC.

“One of the six motivations the Bank of Israel has identified for a possible issuance of a Digital Shekel or CBDC is to enable the public to pay digitally while maintaining a limited level of privacy,” said Yoav Soffer, Advisor to the Deputy Governor, Bank of Israel. “The bank tested an innovative technology developed by VMware, which makes it possible for policy makers to define a periodic amount of digital payments that can be made anonymously. VMware was an excellent partner in exploring how technology could support policy goals in the future monetary system. Our joint journey in the exploration of VMware Blockchain and its privacy preserving technology was fascinating.”

VMware partnered with <a href="https://www.infosys.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Infosys</a>, a leading Global Systems Integrator and an industry leader in developing enterprise Blockchains. Infosys was one of the early adopters of VMware Blockchain for DAML and is now the first partner to develop a solution on VMware Blockchain for Ethereum. Expanding on their immense expertise in developing enterprise blockchain solutions, Infosys developed a <a href="https://www.infosys.com/services/blockchain/insights/management-solution.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Vital Records Management Solution</a> on VMware Blockchain for Ethereum. This offering will help government clients modernize records management and provide a superior digital experience for their citizens. The offering is available to customers as a free 60-day trial to try before use.

“Infosys is very happy to be the first partner to develop an important application for verification of vital records on VMware Blockchain. This offering will enable government agencies around the world to reduce their reliance on manual paper record processes, reduce fraud and lower operating costs while simultaneously offering superior citizen-centered experiences," said Gopikrishnan Konnanath, Senior Vice President, Global Head – Engineering Services and Blockchain, Infosys.

Customers interested in joining the VMware Blockchain for Ethereum beta program, <a href="https://via.vmw.com/3HlJCD" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">click here to apply</a>. For more information on VMware Blockchain for Ethereum, please <a href="https://octo.vmware.com/author/blockchain/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">click here</a>. <a href="https://www.infosys.com/services/blockchain/insights/management-solution.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Click here</a> to know more about Vital Records Management Solution.

VMware is launching VMware Blockchain for Ethereum, available now in beta, to address enterprise use cases.

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VMware Blockchain is Bringing Ethereum to the Enterprise - VMware News and Stories

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Eloy Ontiveros

The revolution sweeping through financial services has brought new purely digital players to the market and is driving massive change through traditional banks and other financial institutions. Across the globe, customers’ digital experience is reshaping traditional banking services and relationships, and the Asia Pacific region is leading this transformation.

Partly in response to a pandemic that closed bank branches worldwide, customers are demanding almost every service to be available digitally, and in most cases, via a mobile app. Every bank is becoming a digital bank. Markets that have had a large unbanked population have, over the last few years, leapfrogged directly into mobile banking, bypassing traditional banking.

According to <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/financial-services/our-insights/future-of-asia-the-future-of-financial-services">McKinsey’s 2021 Personal Finance Survey</a>, the share of consumers in Asia actively using digital banking has jumped to 88% this year, compared to 65% four years ago. More than 60% of Asian consumers are now open to switching to a digitally-focused “direct” bank, McKinsey reports.

And financial services companies are raising their digital game. In VMware’s own <a href="https://www.vmware.com/asean/company/news/releases/2021/Gearing_Up_for_Growth_Go_Digital_First.html">Digital Frontiers 3.0 study</a>, more than half of respondents said financial services groups in Southeast Asia had improved digital services compared to before the pandemic. 

The big digital shift has helped open the door for fintech players like <a href="https://www.antgroup.com/en">Ant Group</a> in China, <a href="https://www.bankbazaar.com/">BankBazaar</a> in India and <a href="https://www.afterpay.com/">Afterpay</a> in Australia to enter the market. It’s a market where the big digital names like PayPal, Stripe and India’s Paytm have already carved out substantial businesses. Along with China’s AliPay and WeChat Pay, which have been acknowledged as global leaders in fintech scale and innovation for some time.

To keep up with the disruption, traditional banks are innovating at a rapid pace and expanding their scope beyond traditional finance and are beginning to offer services that look more like those of pure fintechs. In Singapore, DBS’ PayLah app offers anything from simple payments to food orders and purchasing of public transport fares, while Thailand’s Kbank has teamed up with Grab for its own e-wallet service offering payments and loans. Services like PayNow in Singapore and the New Payments Platform in Australia allow customers of multiple banks to make payments to each other using only mobile phone numbers. Chinese giant Ping An, which started life as a conventional insurer, has become a technological powerhouse offering services across areas as diverse as healthcare, auto services and real estate. In India, HDFC Bank offers AI-powered 10-second car loan approvals.

<strong>Customer-Driven Transformation</strong>

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One of the major drivers of the success of the new fintech players is their superior customer experience and ease of use. Traditional banks are innovating faster than ever to improve customer experience.

At VMworld, several leading financial institutions shared how they are transforming to become digital-led banks. Customer experience is key, powered by a move away from legacy infrastructure to agile, cloud-based platforms to keep up with what customers want.

In my discussions with banking technology leaders, there were some key common themes among their transformation strategies that stood out:

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Eyeing the democratization of finance and greater competition, regulators around the Asia Pacific region seem keen to encourage the growth of new digital financial services. In this environment, some banks are even planning to shift their core banking systems into the cloud—something that would have seemed unlikely not that long ago. More regulatory leeway is also increasing the speed of change, which is adding to the pressure on all players to keep up.

And all this is happening in an environment of greatly increased competition. As well as the new breed of fintechs, companies from other industries, such as telco, are also beginning to offer financial services to their large existing customer bases.

“We are a tech company with a banking license,” is something we now hear all the time as traditional banks embrace tech and forge partnerships to compete in this new marketplace.

We are witnessing some of the biggest changes in financial technology since banks first computerized in the middle of last century and are heading into an exciting and customer-driven new era.

Digital banking trends are reshaping traditional banking services and relationships. The Asia-Pacific region is leading this transformation.

Digital Banking Trends in Asia Pacific | VMware News & Stories

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Guru Venkatachalam

<em>Companies Expand Partnership to Help</em><em> </em><em>Meet Customers’ Data Sovereignty and Interoperability Needs</em><em>, and Align with Gaia-X Principles</em>

<strong>PARIS, France and PALO ALTO, Calif., USA (4 May 2022) - </strong>Atos and VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW) today announced an extension of the companies’ <a href="https://atos.net/en/about-us/partners-and-alliances/vmware" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">strategic partnership</a> by working to deliver an integrated set of capabilities to help speed up the development of “Data Spaces”. Data Spaces are platforms that allow for greater exchange, collaboration, and monetization of data between organizations or industries, independently of the underlying infrastructure, whilst enabling data sovereignty and interoperability.

With the VMware and Atos collaboration effort on Data Space development, the companies plan to deliver an integrated set of capabilities that help enable data and industry applications to be used and shared more strategically to boost national and regional digital economies. The expanded collaboration will deliver capabilities aligned to the <a href="https://www.gaia-x.eu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Gaia-X</a> architecture and serve as a key enabler and booster of the Gaia-X initiative, which seeks to accelerate the exchange of data through new digital platforms that comply with common rules.

Atos and VMware plan to combine VMware’s multi-cloud and app modernization capabilities with the Atos cloud, as well as cybersecurity expertise and technology integration from Atos. The capabilities are designed to provide businesses and industries with the key building blocks to rapidly design, develop, deploy, better secure, and manage Data Spaces that are compliant with jurisdictional data governance requirements. Organizations can also utilize and monetize existing data to create machine learning and artificial intelligence services, and enable new industry-specific services for:

“With a comprehensive set of data space capabilities from VMware and Atos, organisations will gain access to a viable and rapid way to more securely share, manage and monetize their data,” said Laurent Allard, Head of Sovereign Cloud EMEA, VMware. “Today’s world is multi-cloud. Aligned to the principles of Gaia-X, the suite of capabilities will be designed to deliver the interoperability, reversibility and security required for European businesses and industries to create value from data and drive their digital ambitions faster.”

“VMware and Atos are long-term partners and share a commitment to helping organisations drive value from data,” said Frédéric Malicki, CTO, Southern Europe, Atos.  “By supporting the acceleration of Data Space development and data sovereignty with the capabilities from VMware and Atos, we expect to give customers the tools to drive value not just from their own data, but also from federated data, collaboratively with partners and peers. Organizations can transform existing data into new services that, for example, could help farmers better predict the weather or human health organizations improve living conditions for the elderly with automated energy management.” 

The capabilities provided by VMware and Atos are expected to include:

These capabilities will be supported by the reversibility, interoperability, and portability VMware’s cloud partners deliver. With data hosted on a common peer-to-peer framework to ensure the compatibility of architecture between cloud providers, organisations can place their data with any of the participating cloud providers to take full advantage of the services they offer, while retaining the ability to move apps or federate data on other cloud provider platforms as required.

For more information on the VMware and Atos Data Space Development Suite please contact <a href="mailto:gaia-x@vmware.com" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">gaia-x@vmware.com</a>

Atos is a global leader in digital transformation with 111,000 employees and annual revenue of c. € 11 billion. European number one in cybersecurity, cloud and high-performance computing, the Group provides tailored end-to-end solutions for all industries in 71 countries. A pioneer in decarbonization services and products, Atos is committed to a secure and decarbonized digital for its clients. Atos is an SE (Societas Europaea), listed on Euronext Paris and included in the CAC 40 ESG and Next 20 indexes. The <a href="https://www.globenewswire.com/Tracker?data=m1nofXTYD1NcguvRHtee6anbEw7WDHXH-ZnB559sOBGAT3tlWKIWLSlG-asSy-ZgwFpAIIXlyBmiz-UILfwnEkRHHl_moyNl7ZU15IqdMKA=" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">purpose of Atos</a> is to help design the future of the information space. Its expertise and services support the development of knowledge, education and research in a multicultural approach and contribute to the development of scientific and technological excellence. Across the world, the Group enables its customers and employees, and members of societies at large to live, work and develop sustainably, in a safe and secure information space.

VMware is a leading provider of multi-cloud services for all apps, enabling digital innovation with enterprise control. As a trusted foundation to accelerate innovation, VMware software gives businesses the flexibility and choice they need to build the future. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is committed to building a better future through the company’s 2030 Agenda. For more information, please visit <a href="http://www.vmware.com/company">www.vmware.com/company</a>.

<em>VMware, Cloud Foundation, and Tanzu are registered trademarks or trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the United States, and other jurisdictions. This article may contain hyperlinks to non-VMware websites that are created and maintained by third parties who are solely responsible for the content on such websites.</em>

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VMware and Atos extend strategic partnership to deliver an integrated set of capabilities to help speed up the development of “Data Spaces”.

VMware & Atos extend strategic partnership to deliver an integrated set of capabilities to help speed up the development of “Data Spaces”

Atos and VMware Join Forces to Help Organizations and Industries Derive Value from Data More Easily - VMware News and Stories

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Atos and VMware Join Forces to Help Organizations and Industries Derive Value from Data More Easily

There has been a fundamental restructuring of cybercrime cartels thanks to a booming dark web economy of scale. Powerful cybercriminal groups now operate like multinational corporations and are relied upon by traditional crime syndicates to carry out illegal activities such as extortion and money laundering. Cybercrime cartels are more organized than ever before and enjoy greater protection and resources from the nation-states that view them as national assets.<sup>1</sup>

With this ground truth serving as the backdrop for the threats facing financial institutions, I interviewed 130 financial security leaders and CISOs from around the world for the fifth edition of the <a href="https://www.vmware.com/learn/security/1414485_REG.html"><strong>Modern Bank Heists report</strong>.</a> This year’s findings should serve as a warning to the financial sector that attackers are moving from dwell to destruction.

<strong>Geopolitical Tension Is Metastasizing in Cyberspace</strong>

Cybercriminals targeting the financial sector often escalate their destructive attacks in order to burn evidence as part of their counter incident response. Our report found that 63% of financial institutions experienced an increase in destructive attacks, a 17% increase from last year. Destructive attacks are launched punitively to destroy, disrupt, or degrade victim systems by taking actions such as encrypting files, deleting data, destroying hard drives, terminating connections, or executing malicious code. In fact, we’ve recently witnessed <a href="https://blogs.vmware.com/security/2022/03/shields-up-prepare-for-destructive-cyberattacks.html">destructive malware</a> like HermeticWiper being launched following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Notably, the majority of financial leaders I spoke to for this report stated that Russia posed the greatest concern to their institution.

Financial institutions were certainly not immune to the recent resurgence of ransomware. 74% of financial security leaders experienced one or more ransomware attacks in the past year, and 63% of those victims paid the ransom. This is a staggering statistic.

One of the reasons that traditional crime syndicates have become loyal dark web customers is because of the well-funded ecosystem of readymade and available ransomware kits. Cybercrime cartels, such as the Conti ransomware gang, have made it as easy as possible for their associates to launch ransomware attacks on critical industries like the financial sector.

A technical analysis in the VMware Threat Analysis Unit’s latest <a href="https://www.vmware.com/resources/security/exposing-malware-in-multi-cloud.html">threat report</a> provides a view into the proliferation of ransomware and how Remote Access Tools (RATs) help adversaries gain control of systems. Ransomware has a sinister relationship with these RATs, given these tools allow bad actors to persist within the environment and establish a staging server that can be used to target additional systems. Once an adversary has gained this limited access, they will typically work to monetize it by relying on the victim’s data for extortion (including double and triple extortion) or through stealing resources from cloud services using cryptojacking attacks.

<strong>Manipulation of Financial Markets</strong>

Cybercrime cartels have realized that the most significant asset of a financial institution is nonpublic market information. 2 out of 3 (66 percent) of the leaders I interviewed experienced attacks that targeted market strategies, and 1 in 4 (25 percent) stated that market data was the primary target for cyberattacks on their financial institution.

What exactly are these cybercrime cartels looking for? We’re witnessing an evolution from bank heist to economic espionage, where cybercriminals target corporate information or strategies that can affect the share price of a company as soon as it becomes public. This information can then be used to digitize insider trading and front-run the market. Our report also found that 44% of Chronos attacks targeted market positions. A Chronos attack involves the manipulation of time stamps – a concerning development considering how critical of a role the clock plays in the markets.

<strong>Defense Is the Best Offense</strong>

Security has become a top-of-mind issue for financial sector leaders. According to our report findings, the majority of financial institutions plan to increase their security budget by 20-30% this year and named extended detection and response (XDR) as their top security investment priority.

As security leaders, we know that a strong defense is the best offense. Modern threat hunting on a weekly basis should be adopted as a best practice to help security teams detect behavioral anomalies, as adversaries can maintain clandestine persistence in an organization’s system. Our report found that currently, only 51% of financial institutions are conducting weekly threat hunts. I am hopeful that this number will jump in next year’s report as threat hunting programs have multiple outputs beyond finding a cybercriminal, such as fueling threat intelligence.

In today’s evolving threat landscape, cybersecurity has become a brand protection imperative. Trust and confidence in the safety of financial institutions depends on effectively avoiding, mitigating, and responding to modern cyber threats.

<strong>Download the full report to learn more: <a href="https://www.vmware.com/learn/security/1414485_REG.html">Modern Bank Heists 5.0</a></strong>

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<a href="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/MBH-5.0-Infographic.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Click here</a> to download the full-size interactive infographic.

Modern Bank Heists 5.0 findings should serve as a warning to the financial sector that attackers are moving from dwell to destruction.

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Tom Kellermann

<strong>PALO ALTO, Calif. and ROUND ROCK, Texas </strong>- February 17, 2022 - Dell Technologies and  VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW) are working with Munich Re, one of the world's leading reinsurers, to create a consistent approach to global IT operations that performs with improved performance and flexibility at the high level of security required for its data-intensive workloads.

Dell and VMware are assisting Munich Re to more easily adhere to compliance requirements and reduce IT costs. <a href="https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/azure-vmware/">Azure VMware Solution</a>, part of Microsoft Azure, and a modern private cloud based on Dell Technologies and VMware will help create a consistent multi-cloud architecture where data and workloads can be processed and delivered exactly where they are required and shared across multiple environments. The multi-cloud architecture will support Munich Re to offer a coherent customer experience across environments through a consistent IT infrastructure that consolidates all of Munich Re’s global data centers into three hubs.

“With Dell Technologies and VMware, we are creating a consistent cloud operating model to standardize our infrastructure and increase our environment’s performance, stability, and resilience in a smart way,” said Robin Johnson, CIO at Munich Re “This modern multi-cloud infrastructure will help us in our daily business operations by providing the agility to match the right cloud to any application or use case.”

The Azure VMware Solution can accelerate application and cloud modernization initiatives with less risk and better economics than traditional approaches. It also allows for the extension or migration of existing VMware workloads natively on Microsoft Azure. Munich Re’s private cloud will be based on Dell VxRail hyperconverged infrastructure systems with VMware Cloud Foundation software. Munich Re will also use VMware vRealize Cloud Management and VMware NSX to enable consistent management across cloud environments and enable security policies that follow workloads wherever they move.

“The insurance industry is going through a technology revolution ranging from how they process claims to how they engage their customers,” said Bradd Lewis, Dell Technologies vice president and global lead for financial services. “Munich Re turned to Dell and VMware with the ambition of creating a multi-cloud strategy, that could provide a powerful and stable IT infrastructure and respond flexibly to the demands of a dynamic industry with a seamless, standardized and automated platform.”

“Across the insurance industry, we are seeing our customers invest in hybrid-cloud strategies to deliver more efficient and tailored solutions for their clients,” said Jennifer Manry, vice president, global industries, VMware. “But to remain resilient, it’s no longer about a ‘cloud first’ approach—it’s about being ‘cloud smart’. Together with Dell, we are uniquely positioned to give Munich Re the power to accelerate innovation with a smarter path to a hybrid-cloud environment that enables the flexibility to scale quickly and move workloads between IT environments without restrictions or trade-offs.”

<strong>A</strong><strong>bout Dell Technologies</strong>

Dell Technologies (NYSE:DELL) helps organizations and individuals build their digital future and transform how they work, live and play. The company provides customers with the industry’s broadest and most innovative technology and services portfolio for the data era.

VMware is a leading provider of multi-cloud services for all apps, enabling digital innovation with enterprise control. As a trusted foundation to accelerate innovation, VMware software gives businesses the flexibility and choice they need to build the future. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is committed to building a better future through the company’s 2030 Agenda. For more information, please visit www.vmware.com/company.

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Copyright © 2022 Dell Inc. or its subsidiaries. All Rights Reserved. Dell Technologies and Dell are trademarks of Dell Inc. or its subsidiaries. VMware, VMware Cloud, NSX and vRealize are registered trademarks or trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the United States and other jurisdictions. Other trademarks may be trademarks of their respective owners. This press release may contain hyperlinks to non-VMware websites that are created and maintained by third parties who are solely responsible for the content on such websites.

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Dell Technologies and VMware are working with Munich Re, one of the world's leading reinsurers, to create a consistent cloud operating model to standardize IT infrastructure and increase performance, stability, and resilience of the company's IT environment

Dell Technologies and VMware are working with Munich Re, one of the world's leading reinsurers, to create a consistent approach to global IT operations that performs with improved performance and flexibility at the high level of security required for its data-intensive workloads. Dell and VMware are also assisting Munich Re to more easily adhere to compliance requirements and reduce IT costs.

Munich Re Improves IT Agility with VMware and Dell

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Dell Technologies and VMware Facilitate Improved IT Agility for Munich Re - VMware News and Stories

Dell Technologies and VMware Facilitate Improved IT Agility for Munich Re

Dell Technologies and VMware are working with Munich Re, one of the world's leading reinsurers, to create a consistent approach to global IT operations that performs with improved performance and flexibility at the high level of security required for its data-intensive workloads.

<p>It’s no surprise that COVID-19 changed—and accelerated—most organizations’ IT plans. As a result, technology executives are increasing their investments in digital technologies. They’re also speeding up what were once multi-year technology plans.</p>
<p>Conducted by MIT Technology Review Insights in association with VMware, <a href="https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/microsites/cio-vantage/vmware-global-mit-executive-study.pdf">Digital Acceleration in the Time of Coronavirus</a><sup>1</sup> reveals how technology strategy contributed to business resiliency and growth. The survey showed that companies ahead of the digital curve were best positioned for success at the onset of the pandemic and in the uncertain times ahead.</p>
<p>In one of the first signs of changing priorities resulting from the crisis, companies quickly shifted to accommodate a surge in the remote workforce. Before COVID-19, on average, only 8% of workforces regularly worked remotely. During the pandemic, this shot up to an average of 27%.</p>
<p>Globally, 75% of respondents believe digital transformation efforts were accelerated by the pandemic. One-third anticipate budget increases for digital investments. Now, IT teams plan to address the shortcomings exposed during the pandemic by prioritizing:</p>
<ol>
<li>Cloud.</li>
<li>Modern apps and infrastructure.</li>
<li>Cybersecurity.</li>
</ol>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23544" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Survey_digital-transformation-accelerated-by-pandemic_VMware-RADIUS.png" alt="" width="936" height="152" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Survey_digital-transformation-accelerated-by-pandemic_VMware-RADIUS.png 936w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Survey_digital-transformation-accelerated-by-pandemic_VMware-RADIUS.png?resize=300,49 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Survey_digital-transformation-accelerated-by-pandemic_VMware-RADIUS.png?resize=768,125 768w" sizes="(max-width: 936px) 100vw, 936px" /></p>
<p>For many, COVID-19 challenged existing business continuity plans. Nearly two-thirds (63%) indicate they had business-continuity plans in place prior to the crisis. However, for many, these were oriented toward traditional disaster recovery. Fewer than half (46%) felt their plans were effective when attempting to cope with the shutdowns.</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23545" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/survey_successful-business-continuity-plans_VMware-RADIUS.png" alt="" width="936" height="167" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/survey_successful-business-continuity-plans_VMware-RADIUS.png 936w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/survey_successful-business-continuity-plans_VMware-RADIUS.png?resize=300,54 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/survey_successful-business-continuity-plans_VMware-RADIUS.png?resize=768,137 768w" sizes="(max-width: 936px) 100vw, 936px" /></p>
<h2>Global Industry Priorities</h2>
<p>Industry-specific themes also emerged across regions. Removing decades-long barriers, healthcare—more than any other industry—is accelerating digital transformation in response to COVID-19. In financial services, there’s evidence that mobile applications are becoming the foremost destination for customer service. Nearly all surveyed financial services leaders (98%) said they’re increasing or maintaining focus on digital-first customer experiences within applications.</p>
<h3>Healthcare</h3>
<p>More than half of healthcare organizations surveyed (51%) are increasing patient experience investments. The most critical is telehealth services worldwide, filling a much-needed gap in serving healthy populations as they care for the sick. Popular solutions include virtual desktops and wearables that can enhance care provider engagement and patient outcomes. To learn more, read the <a href="http://blogs.vmware.com/industry-solutions/2020/12/15/mit-technology-review-8-trends-shaping-health-it/">healthcare insights blog</a>.</p>
<h3>Financial Services</h3>
<p>Almost two-thirds of financial services organizations (65%) said they’ve expanded agile practices and continuous delivery (CD) methods in response to new modern app demands. Securing those apps is also being prioritized. More than half (53%) instituted “secure-by-design” application development. Both initiatives are critical to enabling apps to become the main customer experience destination for banking services. To learn more, read the <a href="https://blogs.vmware.com/industry-solutions/2020/12/15/mit-technology-review-impact-of-digital-investments-on-financial-services-organizations-throughout-pandemic/">financial services insights blog</a>.</p>
<h3>Government</h3>
<p>For government leaders, the number one priority and challenge is protecting against cyberattacks and securing data and information. Close to half of respondents indicate they’re allocating a “significant” share (defined as more than 25%) of their IT budgets to security and threat management.</p>
<p>Many are choosing solutions that build in security, rather than bolt it on, from data centers to multi-cloud and endpoint devices. At the same time, agencies increasingly look to boost agility and efficiency with public cloud and FedRamp Authorized cloud services that power and secure enterprise infrastructure and apps. To learn more, read the <a href="http://blogs.vmware.com/industry-solutions/2020/12/15/mit-technology-review-8-government-it-trends/">government insights blog</a>.<strong> </strong></p>
<h3>Telecommunications Providers</h3>
<p>Services delivered across networks will drive a more fully connected world. Telecommunications providers are enabling customers across all industries to reimagine application development and delivery. To help consumers and enterprises alike realize the potential of 5G, telco providers must first continue to invest in their own digital transformation—from core to edge.</p>
<h3>Retail</h3>
<p>During the pandemic, distributed work capabilities quickly turned into business continuity must-haves. When asked about the greatest employee experience challenge, most retail leaders cited providing employees with the physical equipment necessary to be productive remotely. This includes capabilities provided by the combination of personal devices and secure digital workspaces.</p>
<h3>Manufacturing</h3>
<p>Nearly three-quarters of manufacturing IT and business technology decision makers (73%) placed employee efficiency and workflow automation as the highest priorities. By achieving efficiency gains through modernizing infrastructure, cost-conscious manufacturers can keep improving IT operations.</p>
<h2>Becoming Future Ready</h2>
<p>COVID-19 work-from-home orders and shutdowns provided sudden, dramatic proof of the value of digital technologies. Now facing new business pressures, new enterprise technology priorities are emerging.</p>
<p>Future-ready organizations possess technologies that are highly flexible and capable of supporting remote operations and distributed workforces. And in these uncertain times, these enterprises are best positioned to succeed.</p>
<p>To learn more, download “Digital Acceleration in the Time of Coronavirus”:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/microsites/cio-vantage/vmware-digital-acceleration-in-the-time-of-coronavirus-north-america.pdf">Outlook North America</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/microsites/cio-vantage/vmware-digital-acceleration-in-the-time-of-coronavirus-europe.pdf">Outlook Europe</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/microsites/cio-vantage/vmware-digital-acceleration-in-the-time-of-coronavirus-asia-pacific.pdf">Outlook Asia-Pacific</a></li>
</ul>
<p>And be sure to check out the <a href="https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/microsites/cio-vantage/vmware-global-mit-executive-study.pdf">Top 10 Trends Shaping IT Resilience</a> for a roundup of the most salient global insights from the study.</p>
<p><em><sup>1. Global survey of 600 C-level and IT executives, as well as in-depth interviews from public- and private-sector organizations in three regions—Asia-Pacific, Europe and North America—conducted between June-August 2020.</sup></em></p>


core/freeform

Global report shows that IT organizations with an existing digital-first operating model proved to be best-prepared for disruption. Explore the findings.

IT organizations with an existing digital-first operating model proved to be best-prepared for disruption. Explore the findings.

Global Survey Ties Digital Investments to Growth, Business Resiliency

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Survey Ties Digital Investments to COVID-19 Business Resiliency, Growth

<p>Look at any major tech news site, and you’ll see blockchain listed as a top emerging technology. It’s also a rising priority for organizations globally. In fact, a 2020 Deloitte Insights report revealed that 55% of surveyed senior-level executives said blockchain “will be critical and in our top-five strategic priorities” in the coming two years.<sup>1</sup></p>
<p>Next-gen enterprises move beyond company boundaries to deliver value to customers and partners by harnessing end-to-end, cross-industry workflows. This requires a single source of truth, for which blockchain is well-suited.</p>


core/pullquote

<h2>What Is Blockchain?</h2>
<p><a href="https://news.vmware.com/blockchain/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Blockchain</a> creates something called a “distributed ledger.” It’s very similar to a general ledger used in financial operations or like your personal checkbook. Debits in the left column, and credits in the right column. It’s distributed to <em>all</em> parties involved in the transaction, so everybody gets a copy. Even business rivals can collaborate on the same distributed ledger because of its built-in privacy with integrity.</p>
<p>The parties involved can be companies that operate independent general ledgers. Without blockchain, these separate general ledgers exist in siloes. With blockchain, however, an immutable and secure distributed ledger can be created and maintained by a network of companies.</p>
<h2>What Does Distributed Trust Mean?</h2>
<p>Blockchain creates and distributes “trust” among all parties for a transaction, powered by a distributed trust infrastructure. It simplifies processes and establishes seamless trust by guaranteeing that everyone’s ledgers are all the same. No one can make changes unless everyone agrees. And when agreement is reached, everyone’s ledgers are updated with the exact same information at the exact same time.</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23527" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/blockchain-vs-database_vmware-radius.jpg" alt="" width="650" height="363" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/blockchain-vs-database_vmware-radius.jpg 650w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/blockchain-vs-database_vmware-radius.jpg?resize=300,168 300w" sizes="(max-width: 650px) 100vw, 650px" /></p>
<p>Another key term is “multi-party workflow,” where companies and individuals work together. Popular examples include:</p>
<ul>
<li>A transaction between a buyer and a seller.</li>
<li>Movement of funds between one bank account to another bank account.</li>
<li>Supply chain management and operations.</li>
</ul>
<p>Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) promises a new, more efficient process that potentially reduces the cost of infrastructure. At the same time, the emerging tech can potentially solve a major challenge facing all industries in our digital age: trust, privacy and confidentiality.</p>
<p>“DLT can provide a way for participants to share information in a way that maintains privacy and confidentiality, but also shares a single source of truth to reduce overall cost for non-productive activities,” said Horacio Barakat, vice president of corporate strategy for Broadridge Financial Solutions.</p>
<h2>How Can Business Leaders Use Blockchain Technology?</h2>
<p>Much of the blockchain interest is being driven from the top down into IT. As shown in the Deloitte study, senior executives are incredibly interested in blockchain. Distributed trust infrastructure could solve business problems that haven’t been solved by other technologies or processes.</p>
<p>Across industries, leaders want to take manual or digitally disparate processes and streamline those significantly. Warranty claims offer an example of very manual processes with multiple parties: buyer, manufacturer, distributor and claims department. All have disparate data sets, rules and processes that often conflict today. This could be quickly streamlined by a chain of records that all match perfectly for everyone in the blockchain consortium.</p>
<p>The same concept applies to insurance, government, online retailers, hospitals and transportation. Basically, any service that requires multiple parties—and that’s pretty much every business today in our digital world—can and eventually will benefit significantly from blockchain.</p>
<p>Financial services, with all the different data sets and records, is perhaps the most used example.</p>
<h2>Why Is Blockchain Particularly Relevant for Financial Services?</h2>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" title="VMware Blockchain for Financial Services Customers" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/g5g5aoWwSrc?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>Accenture estimates that 90% of banks have funded blockchain pilot or production programs.<sup>3</sup> Why? <strong>All financial services transactions are multi-party workflows.</strong></p>
<p>Banks are in the business of sending money to other banks in a secure, trusted manner. Each bank is a node in a network of banks. Even the simplest financial services transaction is a multi-party workflow. For example, let’s imagine that a consumer is about to pay her $50 grocery bill with a Visa debit card. How many parties are involved?  At least five:</p>
<ol>
<li>The consumer</li>
<li>The consumer’s bank</li>
<li>The grocery store</li>
<li>The grocery store’s bank</li>
<li>Visa</li>
</ol>
<p>Now, imagine the universe of financial services companies:</p>
<ul>
<li>Banks</li>
<li>Broker-dealers</li>
<li>Investment managers</li>
<li>Payment processors</li>
<li>Insurance companies</li>
<li>Industry utilities or clearinghouses</li>
<li>Government-sponsored entities</li>
<li>Central banks</li>
<li>And many others</li>
</ul>
<p>Complicated rules govern the funds flowing among these many financial services companies. Also, regulators and auditors need to review financial operations data on a regular basis. DLT helps streamline and simplify these flows. It also helps streamline and simplify reporting and auditing.</p>
<p>Another important capability of blockchain is “smart contracts.” These computer programs automatically execute, control and/or document legally relevant events and actions according to the terms of a contract or an agreement. With smart contracts, financial transactions can be streamlined, radically eliminating manual processing. Smart contracts also automate reporting and enable real-time auditing.</p>
<h2>Blockchain in the Real World: Co-Innovation Spotlight</h2>
<p>A powerful financial services case study is the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX).</p>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" title="VMware Blockchain for Australian Securities Exchange" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9yrQYwn519w?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>For more than 25 years, ASX has used its proprietary Clearing House Electronic Subregister System (CHESS) to record and manage shareholdings and transactions. However, the legacy system is now past its prime. Originally designed to support 25,000 trades per day, today’s CHESS has evolved to meet the demands in a constantly changing market ecosystem, said ASX CIO Dan Chesterman.</p>
<p>ASX needs a new solution that supports growing trading markets—locally and globally:</p>
<ul>
<li>Meets high resilience and stability benchmarks.</li>
<li>Reduces risk and cost in its user operations.</li>
<li>Enables the benefits of secure data sharing, while protecting its customers’ privacy.</li>
</ul>
<p>So, the company is turning to DLT.</p>
<p>“When we determined that we needed to replace CHESS, we looked around, but there isn’t a shrink-wrapped system that can be easily implemented. We recognized that significant investment was needed,” Chesterman said.</p>


<p>The ASX team set forth on an audacious project to transform the way it conducts its billion-dollar business. They realized that partnership with experts was the best path forward. Chesterman and his team are working with Digital Asset and VMware to co-innovate their new DLT solution. They’re also tapping a number of specialist consulting and solution providers, who are creating software that can leverage the distinctive capabilities of this modern infrastructure.</p>
<p>“(Financial services companies) are significant businesses with significant implications as to what happens if these businesses don’t open in the morning and deliver the value to those markets. Because of that, just using native blockchain for those apps wouldn’t work,” said Yuval Rooz, co-founder and CEO, Digital Asset.</p>
<p>“The stack is very complicated. When we started our approach, we actually developed our very own blockchain. Very early on, we started realizing that there’s going to be this very clear separation throughout the stack, where companies like Broadridge or ASX are going to be at the top of the stack,” Rooz said. “They’re going to develop these applications. They’re going to operate them. They’re going to offer these products to their clients.</p>
<p>“Then, we thought about the language layer that will be used to build these applications. In our opinion, there’s not going to be one ledger. And, therefore, this abstraction will be called the ledger, and the application should have this clean separation,” he continued.</p>
<p>“At the bottom you have this distributed ledger—the infrastructure that’s going to drive these apps. Each one of these layers requires its own expertise, its own knowledge. So, when we found out VMware was working on blockchain, we were bullish on creating this partnership to bring our expertise together with VMware’s expertise. We saw that that combination would be really powerful.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.vmworld.com/en/video-library/search.html#text=%22blockchain%22&#038;year=2020" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Watch this on-demand VMworld 2020 session to learn more about the co-innovation between ASX, Digital Asset and VMware</a>.</p>
<h2>Blockchain: Emerging Technology or Solution for Today?</h2>
<p>Like so many innovations before it, blockchain is <em>new</em>. And like all the new tech innovations before it, that means risk. Standards haven’t been developed. And according to leaders surveyed in the Deloitte study<sup>1</sup>, there are many adoption challenges, including:</p>
<ol>
<li>Replacing or adapting existing legacy systems (35%)</li>
<li>Potential security threats (34%)</li>
<li>Concerns over sensitivity of competitive information (34%)</li>
<li>Lack of regulatory clarity (32%)</li>
<li>Lack of in-house capabilities (skills and understanding) (31%)</li>
<li>Challenges in forming a consortium (31%)</li>
<li>Burdensome regulatory environment (30%)</li>
<li>Uncertain ROI (29%)</li>
<li>Lack of a compelling application of the technology (29%)</li>
<li>The technology is unproven (27%)</li>
</ol>
<p>Since you don’t do blockchain alone, interoperability is vital. Vendors like Microsoft and Oracle are coming out with blockchain solutions, but companies don’t want to get locked into a single vendor. And if members of a consortium run different software or languages than other members, you have a major compatibility issue.</p>
<p>“For me, the difficulty and the challenge we need to solve for is creating the necessary network of participants that actually agree on a new way of doing things and a new way of communicating,” said Barakat.</p>
<p>Barakat believes that partnership and collaboration is the best way to take blockchain and DLT from an emerging technology to a new standard.</p>


<p>He points to the three key elements of expertise needed to bring blockchain to broad, enterprise-grade adoption:</p>
<ol>
<li>The “grand idea” (aka the new technology)</li>
<li>The understanding of the market</li>
<li>The enterprise-grade infrastructure to deploy at scale</li>
</ol>
<p>“Those three pieces, that is the co-innovation. You wouldn’t be successful without any of those three pieces,” Barakat said.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.vmware.com/products/blockchain.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Learn more about VMware Blockchain</a>.</p>
<p><sup>1. Deloitte Insights. &#8220;Deloitte&#8217;s 2020 Global Blockchain Survey: From Promise to Reality,&#8221; 2020. https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/insights/us/articles/6608_2020-global-blockchain-survey/DI_CIR%202020%20global%20blockchain%20survey.pdf<br />
2. International Data Corporation (IDC). &#8220;Worldwide Blockchain Spending Guide,&#8221; 2020. https://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=IDC_P37345<br />
3. Accenture Digital. &#8220;Blockchain Technology: How Banks Are Building a Real-Time Global Payments Network,&#8221; 2016. https://www.accenture.com/t00010101T000000Z__w__/fr-fr/_acnmedia/PDF-35/Accenture-Blockchain-How-Banks-Building-Real-Time-Global-Payment-Network.PDFla%3Dfr-FR%23zoom%3D50</sup></p>
<p> </p>


Momentum is growing for blockchain, particularly in financial services. Here's what you need to know about enterprise blockchain and popular use cases.

Read about the trending blockchain market opportunities, tech innovation and use cases.

Blockchain: What Business Leaders Need to Know

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Blakely Thomas-Aguilar

<p>DBS Bank has a history of innovation. As Southeast Asia’s largest bank, DBS is today a tech company that happens to provide financial services. That ambition requires significant investment in technology and, more importantly, its people.</p>
<p>“The reason we’ll outperform our competition isn’t because of tech or IP, but because our people believe in what they’re doing,” said Piyush Gupta, DBS Group CEO.</p>
<h2>Using Tech to Protect</h2>


<p>Every part of DBS’ business—from cash management to private banking and from SME to retail—is enriched by digital transformation.</p>
<p>When a DBS Bank employee tested positive for the novel coronavirus earlier this year, the bank used data from office access cards and personal calendars to conduct contact tracing within days. With the Covid-19 spreading, within weeks, they rolled out digital platforms that enabled business customers to submit forms without visiting a branch. These measures helped reduce risk and protect employees and customers amid Covid-19.</p>
<p>In a traditional bank, it takes months or more to roll out updates and new services. DBS did it in weeks and days.</p>
<p>“Through our partnership with DBS, their developers can self-provision the infrastructure that they need within the same day and serve their customers quickly,” said Sanjay Deshmukh, vice president and managing director for Southeast Asia and Korea at VMware.</p>
<p>Digitalizing DBS’ internal processes generated an abundance of benefits. By adopting continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD), DBS rolled out releases 10 times faster than before. For example, agile processes and a modern computing and cloud infrastructure enabled DBS to use video analytics to determine office space occupancy and decompress work areas. By ensuring safe distancing guidelines were properly implemented, DBS was able to provide a safe working environment for employees required to come into the office for critical banking services.</p>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" title="The secret behind the innovative architecture of the &#039;World&#039;s Best Bank&#039;" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bmT5Y02mjz8?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>“Right now, the crisis may seem like the worst of times because IT folks are working hard to keep the lights on. But it’s also the best of times because it has brought forth the value of technology and the investments we’ve made to modernize our technology stack,” said Jimmy Ng, CIO and head of technology and operations at DBS.</p>
<p>As a result of the pandemic, DBS is exploring new business continuity innovations. Gupta believes 5G will make it easier to work from home. It also offers new customer value by extending relevant banking services, like mobile ATMs, to more locations quickly.</p>


<p>When DBS recognized the need to make the switch from legacy systems to an updated infrastructure, they didn’t want to lose their existing talent pool. Instead, they invested in programs for employees to “re-skill” themselves and learn how to operate the new systems. DBS also decided to bring more of its technology talent in-house and create its own core competencies. This came in the form of building a “development shop” specifically for DBS talent.</p>
<p>&#8220;DBS is committed to doing our part to build a strong pipeline of talent in Singapore equipped with the right skills for the new digital economy,” said Ng. The financial institution will complement training with hands-on experience in managing DBS&#8217; private cloud, from engineering a resilient active-active cloud platform to automating cloud operations at scale.</p>
<p>Cloud skills are highly relevant as DBS powers ahead with their digital transformation journey and contribute to Singapore&#8217;s aspiration to be a Smart Nation. In 2019, the bank was named World&#8217;s Best Digital Bank by <a href="https://www.euromoney.com/article/b18k8wtzv7v23d/worlds-best-digital-bank-2018-dbs">Euromoney</a> for its industry leadership in leveraging digital technology to shape the future of banking – one of four global Best Bank accolades DBS has been awarded since 2018.</p>
<p>“We continuously innovate to better serve the nation. Towards this end, we always explore ways to continue providing robust cloud infrastructure for our business needs,” said Gupta.</p>
<h2>Getting Future Ready</h2>
<p>Organizations like DBS continue to adapt, respond, and accelerate their business in this new digital paradigm. On this journey, it’s imperative to upskill the workforce and train a new generation of tech talent.</p>
<p>As part of its commitment to support Asia’s digital ecosystem, VMware announced its “Getting Future Ready” initiative. In partnership with Singapore-based companies, including DBS, the initiative will deepen the country’s expertise and specialization in next-generation technologies. Conducted in-person and online, the program provides trainees with the opportunity to learn and engage with industry specialists through hackathons, hands-on labs, gamification, and more.</p>
<p>“The vibrancy and strength of Singapore’s innovation economy, along with its deep pool of tech talent, serve as a powerful testament to the country’s Smart Nation ambitions,” said Adrian Hia, country manager, VMware Singapore.</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter wp-image-23378 size-full" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Screenshot_2020-11-24-Search.png" alt="" width="1446" height="413" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Screenshot_2020-11-24-Search.png 1446w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Screenshot_2020-11-24-Search.png?resize=300,86 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Screenshot_2020-11-24-Search.png?resize=768,219 768w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Screenshot_2020-11-24-Search.png?resize=1024,292 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 1446px) 100vw, 1446px" /></p>


<p>Join former VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger and DBS Group CEO Piyush Gupta as they discuss the current business climate, including the growth opportunities of shifting to run like an agile tech company and the partnership between the two organizations allowing for innovation to thrive.</p>

corpnews-blocks/banner

As organizations grapple with the impact of COVID-19, DBS approaches everything through the filter of disruption, technology and nurturing.

As organizations grapple with the impact of COVID-19, DBS approaches everything through the filter of disruption, technology, and nurturing.

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Why DBS Bank's IT Team Makes People the Priority during the Pandemic

<p>For iSelect, forward-thinking decisions made prior to the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates the importance of cloud transformation.</p>
<p>The insurance, utilities and personal finance purchasing service prides itself in being more than simply a comparison website. The majority of iSelect’s customers chose to speak over the phone with one of the company’s 190+ trained specialists.  As a high-touch service driven by human connection, the pandemic presented iSelect with a number of business continuity challenges. To support employee productivity, iSelect needed to fast-forward its already planned cloud transformation to:</p>
<ol>
<li>Secure access to core business applications and sensitive customer data.</li>
<li>Set-up quality call connections in employees’ homes without lag.</li>
<li>Continue collaboration and digital connection.</li>
</ol>
<h2>Adapting to the New Normal</h2>
<p>The swift work-from-home transition was made possible by iSelect’s cloud transformation. In fact, the demands of the pandemic expedited its journey.</p>
<p>“We were already on a cloud transformation journey and have been working towards cloud-native. In January, we refreshed our hardware. And during that transition, we set the devices up on the cloud, so we could manage the devices centrally,” said Shannon Henwood, head of technology, iSelect.</p>
<p>In hindsight, this was extremely fortunate timing. Most organizations would never embark on an extensive transformation during a time as critical as a pandemic. But “that was how it happened,” Henwood said. And while it was a complex undertaking, iSelect’s success story demonstrates what’s possible.</p>
<p>With support from VMware and AWS, iSelect lifted its entire computing and storage infrastructure from the data center to the public cloud—within mere weeks.</p>
<ol>
<li>Migrated existing physical and virtual servers to the cloud infrastructure.</li>
<li>Refactored for the advantages of cost-savings and scalability.</li>
<li>Retired legacy applications.</li>
</ol>


<h2>Reaping the Fruits of Cloud Transformation</h2>
<p>Simultaneously, iSelect reaped the advantages of cost optimization. “Being cloud-native means you no longer need to go buy storage, but instead, use it when you need it,” explained Henwood. Cloud transformation proved “very effective in terms of cost,” he continued.</p>


<h2>Ensuring Triple Protection against Cyberthreats</h2>
<p>Alongside empowering employees, a vital element was ensuring that customer data remained secure. This is especially important as <a href="https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/cybersecurity-for-a-remote-workforce/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">cyber risks increase with a remote workforce</a>.</p>
<p>Henwood believes security is everyone’s responsibility, and employee accountability is key. iSelect prioritizes integrating resources that focus on getting ahead of emerging threats. With <a href="https://cloud.vmware.com/vmc-aws" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">VMware Cloud on AWS</a>, iSelect has a more secure infrastructure and connectivity. Additional authentication and encryption on telephony add an extra layer of security.</p>
<p>And since <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/12/our-hardware-is-under-cyberattack-heres-how-to-make-it-safe/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">compromised hardware can undermine</a> additional layers of the system’s cybersecurity, iSelect no longer “[has] to worry about the data center anymore or hardware going down or connectivity issues by being in the cloud,” Henwood said.</p>
<h2>Looking Forward</h2>
<p>When asked if he will go back to the way it was before, Henwood replied, “No. Technology and enablement wasn’t front and center previously. And we want to keep innovating and using technology in a smart way that keeps up this new efficiency. Needing to have someone physically set up a computer in a particular location is no longer viable. I do not want to go back to that.”</p>
<p>Ultimately Henwood said, “Flexibility is key. The only constant is change. I do not know what will happen in the next six weeks, but we need to keep an open mind. Keep looking at emerging technologies. Keep being creative. And change is coming, so brace for it.”</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1"></a></p>


For iSelect, forward-thinking decisions made prior to the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates the importance of cloud transformation.

iSelect Accelerates Its Cloud Transformation | VMware Radius

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<p>March 2020 was an unforgettable month for employees at the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE). As COVID-19 cases climbed across Asia, the Indian government announced total lockdown of its 1.3 billion citizens, giving less than 4 hours’ notice before the order took effect.</p>
<p>For the very first time, NSE employees had to experiment with working from home while daily trading volumes doubled to 4 billion orders per day.</p>
<p>As the world’s largest exchange in derivatives trading, all eyes were on NSE. Getting things right from the start has never been more critical.</p>
<h2>Change Is the Name of the Game</h2>
<p>Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, NSE had already begun re-imagining business processes and modernizing applications.</p>
<p>“In less than 24 hours, we worked with VMware to roll out the <a href="https://www.vmware.com/products/workspace-one.html">Workspace ONE solution</a> to all essential staff. In the next two weeks, all NSE staff had access to their virtual desktops,” shared Shiv Kumar Bhasin, chief technology and operations officer at NSE.</p>
<p>Looking back, Bhasin said the impact on productivity was powerful. He shared that NSE made critical changes that would’ve taken twice the amount of time in pre-COVID days. He attributes the speed of development to the exchange’s hybrid cloud. This model enabled seamless collaboration between agile teams working remotely.</p>
<p>Development tools were also made available through cloud. Now, developers can access resources at any time in an agile and secure manner. At any point, developers can connect up to five devices and choose to work on the most suitable device for the task at hand.</p>
<p>“Whenever we noticed a skills gap, we were able to crowdsource external talent from the best and brightest developers across the world and easily collaborate through the cloud. These cloud-native solutions were then moved to NSE’s on-prem data servers to ensure the exchange continued to fulfill stringent regulatory and data security requirements,” said Bhasin.</p>
<p>This level of collaboration would have been impossible if NSE’s hybrid cloud solutions did not fulfill security requirements. “As a capital markets leader and frontline market regulator, NSE relies on a cybersecurity-conscious critical infrastructure platform to meet the highest regulatory compliance,” said Bhasin.</p>
<p>For example, NSE needs to ensure data on Indian entities remain within the geographical limits of the country. This means it could only utilize secure servers based in India.</p>


<p>Many organizational roles deserve significant praise for business continuity efforts during the pandemic. Their business continuity plans (BCPs) kept operations going and ensured that employees stayed connected, secure and productive.</p>

<h2>Benefits Beyond Workplace Productivity</h2>
<p>Employees save precious time and headspace when they no longer need to commute to work in the <a href="https://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/traffic-index/ranking/">fourth-most congested city in the world</a>. In Mumbai, commuters previously spent an average of 209 hours a year stuck in traffic. Working from home also improved air quality. With fewer cars on the road, Mumbai recorded a <a href="https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/air-pollution-levels-in-mumbai-drop-by-76-post-lockdown/articleshow/75708175.cms">76% decline in particle</a> matter and NO<sub>2</sub> concentration levels, the steepest decline out of five major cities in India.</p>
<p>Without the burden of the commute, parents and primary caregivers now have more opportunities to participate in the workforce. They can bring their diverse talents and backgrounds to make the exchange more inclusive.</p>
<h2>Turning to Customer Experiences</h2>
<p>“We were focused on the core systems to ensure they could be taken into the next generation. But as soon as the pandemic happened, our priorities changed,” said Bhasin. “We have to first address various touchpoints we have with members. They are legacy channels and are not end-to-end digital in nature.”</p>
<h2>Automating Business Processes</h2>
<p>NSE learned that automating services and minimizing in-person human interaction catered to end-user needs. Whether it’s services for customers or employees, automation is now at the heart of delivering more meaningful customer engagements and employee experiences. NSE is also actively moving towards a self-service model for its IT needs.</p>
<p>Bhasin said, “Cloud technologies have enabled NSE’s digital transformation journey and created better collaboration for our distributed workforce.”</p>


<p>The global pandemic exposed many vulnerabilities across the business landscape. Organizations have realized the need to become more resilient and flexible in the face of future challenges.</p>

As the world’s largest exchange in derivatives trading, all eyes were on the National Stock Exchange of India at the start of the pandemic.

All eyes were on the National Stock Exchange of India at the start of the pandemic.

At 4B Transactions a Day, Every Nanosecond Counts

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At 4B Financial Transactions a Day, Every Nanosecond Counts

<p>Application modernization is at the forefront of most enterprise transformation initiatives. Modern apps help organizations adapt quickly in changing times, whether that means:</p>
<ul>
<li>Rapidly introducing new ways of serving customers wherever they are; or</li>
<li>Enabling digital collaboration when in-person communication is disrupted.</li>
</ul>
<p>And app modernization is on the rise, gaining traction in some unlikely places.</p>
<p>Founded more than 130 years ago, <a href="https://www.northerntrust.com/united-states/home">Northern Trust Corporation</a> has transformed itself into an agile, digital institution. Cloud and related technologies create exceptional experiences for its customers and employees.</p>
<p>“We&#8217;ve been on a cloud journey since early 2013 and made some bold early bets on hyperconverged infrastructure, software-defined data centers, containers, platform as a service and CI/CD (continuous integration, continuous delivery),” said Vijay Luthra, Northern Trust Chief Technology Officer, during <a href="https://www.vmworld.com/">VMworld 2020</a>. Luthra joined VMware experts for the VMworld 2020 Solutions Keynote “Modern Apps — Get Better Software into Production Faster.”</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23264" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Vijay_Luthra_VMware.png" alt="Vijay Luthra, CTO, Northern Trust" width="980" height="475" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Vijay_Luthra_VMware.png 980w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Vijay_Luthra_VMware.png?resize=300,145 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Vijay_Luthra_VMware.png?resize=768,372 768w" sizes="(max-width: 980px) 100vw, 980px" /></p>
<p>“We also made big bets on an event-based fabric, as well as a service mesh,” Luthra continued. “As we move toward (becoming) a real-time, agile enterprise, our investments have allowed us to easily transition to a hybrid cloud architecture with microservices leveraging cloud-based services for compute, while data continues to securely reside in our private cloud.”</p>
<p>Throughout its transformation, Luthra said, Northern Trust’s application modernization efforts yielded measurable results. The company’s developers:</p>
<ul>
<li>Reduced time to market by 70%.</li>
<li>Cut the resources required for build activities by 80%.</li>
<li>Boosted production deployments six-fold, automating 100% of those deployments.</li>
<li>Significantly improved reliability and stability.</li>
</ul>
<p>Northern Trust achieved these results through an architecture that’s responsive to internal stakeholders’ needs, while giving developers the platform they require to deliver capabilities at a high velocity.</p>
<p>“Our cloud journey has evolved quite a bit over the years,” Luthra said. “However, our commitment to delivering products and services to our clients rapidly by providing a frictionless experience to our developers remains as important as ever.”</p>
<h2>Modern Apps Deliver Business Outcomes</h2>
<p>The architectures on which modern apps are built and the platforms through which they’re delivered continue to evolve. This new model gives organizations the ability to run apps over multiple clouds and embrace autonomous, self-service development models.</p>
<p>“Cloud and cloud-native architectures have lowered the barrier to entry for building new applications,” said Ajay Patel, general manager, modern apps at VMware. “Seventy-five percent of applications supporting digital business today are expected to be custom built. That&#8217;s because modern apps deliver real business impact.”</p>
<p><strong>Business leaders want to modernize their apps for three primary reasons:</strong></p>
<ol>
<li>Build new revenue-generating customer experiences.</li>
<li>Manage growing volume of software and vulnerabilities.</li>
<li>Take advantage of innovations offered by the cloud.</li>
</ol>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23263" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/enterprise_app_modernization.png" alt="Why Are Enterprises Modernizing Apps?" width="1365" height="636" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/enterprise_app_modernization.png 1365w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/enterprise_app_modernization.png?resize=300,140 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/enterprise_app_modernization.png?resize=768,358 768w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/enterprise_app_modernization.png?resize=1024,477 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 1365px) 100vw, 1365px" /></p>
<p>And how enterprises modernize their apps will depend on various factors, including where those apps will live—on-premises, in a public cloud or at the edge. Organizations may decide to “lift and shift” some applications, essential migrating legacy applications to the cloud as they are. Teams may also:</p>
<ul>
<li>Containerize legacy applications.</li>
<li>Rewrite legacy code.</li>
<li>Disaggregate legacy code into microservices.</li>
<li>Build new cloud-native apps.</li>
</ul>
<p>The more teams steer development efforts toward cloud-native apps, the more they can enjoy the benefits of automation and more quickly launch new features and capabilities.</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23260" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/defining_app_modernization.png" alt="Defining Application Modernization" width="1430" height="697" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/defining_app_modernization.png 1430w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/defining_app_modernization.png?resize=300,146 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/defining_app_modernization.png?resize=768,374 768w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/defining_app_modernization.png?resize=1024,499 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 1430px) 100vw, 1430px" /></p>
<p>“VMware is uniquely set up to deliver application speed and agility with the infrastructure modernization to move across any cloud,” Patel said. In fact, VMware offers the <a href="https://octo.vmware.com/the%E2%80%AFcounterintuitively%E2%80%AFfastest-path-to%E2%80%AFapp-modernization-part-1%E2%80%AF/">counterintuitively fastest path to app modernization</a>.</p>
<p>The lightweight container model for cloud software is popular because it supports greater speed and agility, results in apps that can run anywhere, simplifies DevOps and more.</p>
<h2>The Keys to Rapid App Development</h2>
<p>Today, enterprises across industries can take advantage of VMware vSphere 7 with Tanzu, available in a variety of editions. It embeds Kubernetes in the vSphere control pane, allowing organizations to easily run containers and virtual machines (VMs) side by side. And it’s an ideal foundation for addressing app modernization from the infrastructure up.</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23261" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/app_modernization_infrastructure.png" alt="How to Address App Modernization Infrastructure-Up" width="1283" height="649" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/app_modernization_infrastructure.png 1283w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/app_modernization_infrastructure.png?resize=300,152 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/app_modernization_infrastructure.png?resize=768,388 768w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/app_modernization_infrastructure.png?resize=1024,518 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 1283px) 100vw, 1283px" /></p>
<p>For developers, Tanzu Application Service—the application runtime environment—is now available on any cloud, according to James Watters, vice president in VMware’s Modern Platforms Business Unit. Watters told VMworld 2020 attendees that Tanzu Application Service is especially suited to developing Java apps using VMware Spring microservices, an increasingly popular approach to app modernization where code is developed in small, independent pieces.</p>
<p>“As you enable developers to move faster, they want to move more independently and they want to be able to scale parts of their codebase independently. And that&#8217;s really where this trend around microservices comes from,” Watters said. “Microservices—especially Spring microservices—have really started to digest and transform the world of legacy middleware.”</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-23262" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/addressing_app_modernizations.png" alt="How to Address App Modernization Application-Down" width="1247" height="751" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/addressing_app_modernizations.png 1247w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/addressing_app_modernizations.png?resize=300,181 300w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/addressing_app_modernizations.png?resize=768,463 768w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/addressing_app_modernizations.png?resize=1024,617 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 1247px) 100vw, 1247px" /></p>
<p>When Northern Trust brought in Tanzu Application Service, it established an operations and engineering team that was focused on developer productivity and speed to market. “Some of our most critical applications are moving toward microservices and leveraging the Tanzu platform for higher resiliency and time-to-market benefits,” said Luthra.</p>
<p>For Northern Trust, agile development drives transformation and app modernization.</p>
<p>“We&#8217;ve taken a unique approach to ensure we stay laser-focused on what developers need, as well as to ensure cross-functional teams come together to enable a high-velocity delivery model,” Luthra said. The company completely reengineered its client-facing business processes, leveraged cloud-based machine-learning and artificial intelligence to mine data and improve communication with clients. The team also reimagined customer-facing experiences by using its hybrid cloud to deliver secure, scalable mobile apps.</p>
<p>“Northern Trust is committed to investing in our technology by continuously rationalizing and transforming our application portfolio,” Luthra said. “Post-COVID, the transformation will only accelerate, and a hybrid cloud architecture will be the foundation of our digitalization strategy.”</p>


<p>To drive real impact, you need to get applications into production, faster.</p>

Northern Trust Corporation transformed itself into an agile, digital institution with an architecture and platform for app modernization. Read their story.

App Modernization at Northern Trust | VMware Radius

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<p><div id="attachment_22243" style="width: 410px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-22243" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-22243 size-full" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Maribel-Lopez.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="400" srcset="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Maribel-Lopez.jpg 400w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Maribel-Lopez.jpg?resize=150,150 150w, https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Maribel-Lopez.jpg?resize=300,300 300w" sizes="(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px" /><p id="caption-attachment-22243" class="wp-caption-text">Maribel Lopez, technology industry analyst and strategic advisor, <a href="https://www.lopezresearch.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Lopez Research</a></p></div></p>
<p>At the start of the global COVID-19 pandemic, many organizations quickly deployed technologies to enable basic <a href="https://news.vmware.com/nologies/tips-enabling-remote-workforce" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">remote work</a>. But some things just broke when people couldn’t sort out issues face-to-face, says Maribel Lopez, technology industry analyst and strategic advisor at Lopez Research. And that’s forcing leaders to completely rethink how they use enterprise technology.</p>
<p>To meet new and rapidly shifting needs, companies are working to adapt and accelerate digital experience delivery. “Even if they were digital, it’s a <em>new</em> digital,” says Lopez. “So out of this very tragic event, there will be some positive outcomes.”</p>
<h2>How Industries Drive Future-Ready Transformation</h2>
<p>Purely physical processes were obvious targets for change as companies pivoted early in the pandemic to respond to digital-only engagement. A few examples include SaaS-based web conferencing apps and cloud-based e-commerce websites.</p>
<p>Despite the digitization of some key processes, Lopez says, “Now business leaders are being reminded that many processes are still physical and must become digital if their companies are going to thrive.”</p>
<p>Fixing those gaps serves as a catalyst for organizations across industries to take a closer look at what <a href="https://news.vmware.com/digital-transformation/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">digital transformation</a> has taken place and what still needs to be done to future ready businesses. Here are a few examples.<strong> </strong></p>
<h3>Healthcare</h3>
<p>Modernization of the healthcare system has been underway for years. Due to the pandemic, however, providers rushed to enable non-essential staff to work from home. They also built pop-up hospitals so essential doctors and nurses could better care for patients.</p>
<p>Simultaneously, healthcare organizations are launching app-based consumer solutions, such as telehealth services, to ensure the continued health of patients and vulnerable populations.</p>
<h3>Retail</h3>
<p>Out of necessity, the retail industry shifted its focus to help shoppers get the products they need as quickly as possible—online, at curbsides, and in stores. To completely transform, though, requires a better understanding of the end-to-end customer experience, for example, why loyal consumers add to shopping carts but never complete a transaction, and the building of modern apps with associate-friendly workflows such as real-time inventory checking.</p>
<h3>Financial services</h3>
<p>In an industry built on relationships, in-branch banking and in-office advisor experiences once dominated. Personal engagement and regulatory requirements created a culture of heavily controlled IT. Now, financial services teams are looking for ways to stay in compliance, while supporting distributed advisors and clients from anywhere.</p>
<h3>Education</h3>
<p>The pandemic forced colleges, universities, and primary and secondary schools across the world to move learning online. This proved the distance learning model can work, but it will need to be further examined and modified to prioritize equity for all.</p>
<h2>The <em>New</em> Digital: The App Experience as the Customer Experience</h2>
<p><div id="attachment_22203" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a href="https://news.vmware.com/nologies/businesscontinues"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-22203" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-22203 size-medium" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/VMware-Truth-About-Transformation-r6v1-Intro_16x9-300x169.gif" alt="" width="300" height="169"></a><p id="caption-attachment-22203" class="wp-caption-text"><a href="https://news.vmware.com/nologies/businesscontinues">Dive deeper into a new global survey that reveals the &#8220;Truth About Digital Transformation.&#8221;</a></p></div></p>
<p>While we know now that digital transformation isn’t failing, per say, have organizations fully embraced the idea that the app experience is the customer experience?</p>
<p>Lopez isn’t so sure. “I think the app experience was always supposed to be part of the customer experience. What happened was the rest of our experience was so broken that in most cases, we couldn’t do cross-channel well.”</p>
<p><strong>She cites two examples:</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>When ordering products via the web is faster than navigating 10-plus clicks on a smartphone, why would people use an app?</li>
<li>When changing airline reservations is faster through the app, why would people pick up the phone?</li>
</ul>
<p>True digital transformation means delivering the same one-or-two click experience across every channel—web, mobile devices, tablets and more. Lopez believes, “Teams now have to focus on pervasive experience. No matter where you are, you have a similar feeling that you can get the same things done no matter the device.”</p>
<p>Traditionally, developers have been unable to give people everything they can get in a PC experience because so many processes are highly customized,” she says.</p>
<p>Enterprises must step back and examine the parts of each process to find the pieces delivering the value. For example, do customers come to a business for its highly customized supply chain process or its product? Chances are it’s the product, she says. This should be a signal for the organization to reduce some customization in favor of providing more consistent cross-channel experiences.</p>
<h2>The Power of Design Thinking</h2>
<p>The way to uncover an app’s essence is to take complicated applications through a <a href="https://news.vmware.com/nologies/design-thinking-julie-stanford">design thinking process</a>. This ensures teams distill each app to its core value with the optimal workflow—whether that’s enabling dynamic pricing or expense report approvals.</p>
<p>A workflow is an action. And when you see organizations with really good workflows, you’re looking at very good business processes. Under the surface, those workflows touch multiple apps to fully complete a process. Think about service technicians with iPads, for example. They can tap into one app and seamlessly launch three or four different workflows. According to Lopez, this capability “becomes very interesting and very powerful.”</p>
<p>“I see teams redesigning this way now and a big move toward the concept of human-centered design. For example, in automotive companies this is now pervasive thinking, which is really important,” she says.</p>
<p>In short context, connection through integration and cross-channel consistency will make modern apps more impactful and useful. Only then can the app experience truly be the customer experience.</p>
<h2>The Third Dimension: Infrastructure Implications</h2>
<p>Enabling connected workflows in and across apps will require more than development skill sets. “It’s going to take a rethink of infrastructure and security, too,” says Lopez.</p>
<p>When the pandemic hit, nearly all organizations were doing some form of a <a href="https://news.vmware.com/c/cloud/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">cloud strategy</a>. “Everybody was looking at public, private and hybrid cloud. Everybody was thinking about or already building a multi-cloud strategy,” she says. Multi-cloud involves having parts of infrastructure on-premises and parts in the cloud.</p>
<p>The biggest challenge facing teams was adding and migrating workloads between cloud options. Now that work is different, Lopez believes we’ve entered into “the third dimension, which is some portion of always-distributed workers—but not always the same group of them.”</p>
<p><div id="attachment_22220" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a href="https://news.vmware.comcustomer-app-experience-business-success/"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-22220" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-22220" src="https://news-editor.vmware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Modern-App-Customer-Experience_VMware-RADIUS-2-300x158.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="158"></a><p id="caption-attachment-22220" class="wp-caption-text"><a href="https://news.vmware.comcustomer-app-experience-business-success/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Related Story: The Connection Between the App Experience &#038; Customer Experience</a></p></div></p>
<p>Productivity is paramount in all cases, so the infrastructure has to change. Teams can no longer optimize computing resources for work across a single building or campus. Instead, they must consider how to scale resources and end-user access at different periods of time and locations using clouds with virtual desktops (VDI), as an example.</p>
<p>In this new world, IT will have to reimagine what infrastructure gets served from where and how security can be maintained but done differently—without burdening workforces. IT has to consider where workloads live (e.g., AWS, Azure, Google or another cloud platform) and how to take previously locked down workloads to other places. Enterprises need a clear multi-cloud strategy and understanding about how to integrate points that previously weren’t considered part of the corporate enterprise, Lopez says.</p>
<p>As a result of this shared experience, Lopez believes the whole concept of infrastructure and how it’s managed will be more diverse. “Less centralized, but still very directed just not all in the same way,” she says. For example, enabling employees to have access to everything they need will be important. Yet, resources are likely to be delivered a certain way when someone is in the office and a different way when working from home.</p>
<p>Technical support structures must change, too. Without human-to-human interactions, how do employees and customers get queries answered and challenges solved when there is no one to call? This is where chatbots come in, says Lopez. She cites a recent example where chatbot technology enabled the automated distribution of information without going through redundant questions. This streamlined interaction made the person-to-person engagement, once it did happen, more effective.</p>


<h2>The Best Human-First Enterprise Tech Platforms…Wait for It…Aren’t Even Built Yet</h2>
<p>Although teams are trying, Lopez hasn’t seen an ideal human-first technology platform for the enterprise. “They aren’t built yet. But we’re getting closer with some human-first mobile apps and aligned IT and business leaders willing to take on the bigger issue, which is the process,” she says.</p>
<p>It’s possible now to deliver faster, easier access to data and apps in technologies like the <a href="https://news.vmware.com/c/digital-workspace/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">digital workspace</a>. But if the experience with individual apps is still poor, people will be frustrated. Part of the challenge, says Lopez, is terminology, which is often too technical and not human-centric. The other is the end-to-end process.</p>
<p>Technology will need to get simpler and self-service has to become the norm, not the exception. Yet, teams can’t use automation as a crutch to avoid rethinking broken processes, says Lopez. Apps and devices must be so easy that anyone can troubleshoot them. It’s going to be impossible with flex remote working schedules to scale effective tech support at work. And it’ll be even harder for industries like retail to help non-tech savvy customers to navigate grocery shopping online, she says.</p>
<p>Emerging technologies like chatbots and <a href="https://news.vmware.com/artificial-intelligence/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">artificial intelligence</a> can help, she says. But the key to success is on her wish list: better conversational and natural language interfaces.</p>
<h2>Embracing Future-Ready Business</h2>
<p>Despite the debate, digital transformation efforts are succeeding. But it can be even more successful when businesses embrace a <em>new</em> digital. Yet, how they get there will depend on their willingness to envision customer and employee experiences differently. Ultimately, successful future-ready businesses will find the connections and redefine the workflows that matter. And only through this reimagining will app experiences truly become the customer experience.</p>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" title="The Debate About Digital Transformation" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/v_5_v3YV4xY?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>


<p>A new global survey reveals that organizations rapidly shifted their digital transformation priorities during the COVID-19 pandemic.</p>

At the start of the pandemic, some things worked and others just broke. And that’s forcing leaders to rethink digital transformation.

What the Pandemic Teaches Us About Digital Transformation

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