The pandemic that is still making its reappearance in certain parts of the world may not last forever but it has certainly changed the way businesses are operated and in several ways the nature of interaction between companies and their customers. And this transformation is anything but temporary.

“After Covid, the whole focus (for businesses) was to get ready for whatever next is going to come. And that’s where automation, digitisation..all that became really important. Now as companies are moving to the digital world, they are seeing that they are dealing with digitally savvy customers..the whole notion of how do you then really use AI...how do you use automation capabilities to really improve not just productivity but how you are delivering your promise, your brand promise, your experience to your end consumers is gaining prominence,” says Sandip Patel, managing director at IBM India and South Asia.

Businesses are increasingly using AI to interact with customers, automate IT processes, garner market insights to service customers better and to automate work processes across departments like HR and supply chain. “As demographic shifts are continuing to add pressure to the modern economies which is coupled with wage inflation and others, we are actually seeing companies are eager to deploy AI and automation capabilities at scale to boost their levels of productivity,” says Patel.

After all, equipping businesses with new tech capabilities will only help them navigate the macroeconomic crisis that is nudging companies to check costs and make efficient use of available resources. Patel says in India particularly, there is a lot of bullishness around tech spends as firms rapidly adopt digitisation to deliver value to customers and ‘drive efficiencies in their own operations.’ “Today emerging technologies like AI, hybrid cloud and quantum have almost become the sutradhar that is enabling us to prepare for what the markets now are asking across both B2B and B2C clients,” says Patel adding that IBM is fully prepared to leverage this shift.

“Over time, we have reoriented our portfolio around the two most transformational technologies of our time which is hybrid cloud and AI. Deploying these two, we are helping businesses seize new opportunities, overcome today’s technology and business challenges,” says Patel.

IBM India/South Asia Managing Director Sandip Patel

Cos eager to deploy AI, automation to boost productivity