Digital boost, but barriers remain

New research shows that businesses have faith in technology to boost their productivity but are facing major knowledge and skill barriers to complete their digital transformation projects. European businesses expect technology digital transformation projects to boost their productivity by an average of 38% in just 3 years with overall Return on Investment (ROI) expected in just under 5 years, senior decision makers have reported. But so far, on average only 15% of organisations have completed their digital transformation projects.

Almost 40% of respondents said they felt their organisation was lagging behind competitors when it came to digital transformation. The major barriers to deploying digital transformation technologies were: Lack of internal knowledge (35%), lack of internal IT people resource and skills (32%), concerns about the interoperability with existing IT infrastructure (30%) and a lack of external specialist IT support or awareness of specialist providers (30%).

“This research shows that European businesses understand that the latest technology solutions can transform their business operations and help them take major strides forward in productivity but for many there are still obvious barriers to overcome,” said Jan Kaempfer, Marketing Director for Panasonic Connect Europe.

“Businesses have a lack of internal expertise and resource and are struggling to find the external specialist support they need to execute their plans. This was precisely the reason why Panasonic Connect Europe was formed just over a year ago – bringing technology hardware, software solutions and service expertise together to help business-to-business organisations address their digital transformation challenges.”