3-D printing, Internet of Things, and biotech/healthcare IT leap to lead portfolio of emerging technologies rising on Cloud and Mobile's long tail of disruption
Three-D printing, Internet of Things (IoT), and biotech/ healthcare IT jumped into the top five of disruptive technologies over the next three years, according to the 2014 KPMG Global Technology Innovation survey.
The trio is among an incremental number of technologies that are gaining momentum, disrupting industries, and enabling new business models. Three-D printing, IoT, and biotech/ healthcare IT were each selected by more than twice as many respondents as last year to move up the survey's list of disruptive technologies. The global findings also highlighted the continuing impact of Cloud and Mobile, and the steady rise of data and analytics, autotech, and artificial intelligence. These disruptive technologies are expected to transform enterprises and enable indispensable consumer technologies. (See video commentary about the impact on businesses).
KPMG surveyed 768 technology business leaders globally, including C-level executives (70 percent of respondents), from technology industry startups, mid-sized to large enterprises, venture capital firms and angel investors to identify disruptive technologies, barriers to tech innovation adoption, and the scope of business disruption and new monetization opportunities driven by emerging technologies.
"The rapid rise of this portfolio of technologies is driven by several factors, ranging from macroeconomic opportunities to local incentives and a growing global tech innovation engine that is creating more rapid widespread disruption. The interplay of these emerging technologies is enabling new business models and fueling innovation in many industries," said Gary Matuszak, Global Chair of KPMG's Technology, Media and Telecommunications practice. "Leaders, across-industries, need to nail the right strategy to outpace existing and new competitors to a much higher degree than in the past. Tech innovation creates an opportunity to drive incremental customer value and monetize new business models resulting from disruptive technologies."
"This research points to the fact that global executives are increasingly seeing mobile technologies and mobile applications as an engine of growth and profitability. The vast increase in the amount of data coming from mobile devices is driving the development of advanced Analytics applications. And, in turn, the growth in Analytics is driving mobile developers to provide new, enhanced solutions that provide new types of data. This new, virtuous circle is powering the growth of global enterprise," said Brad Fisher, KPMG's U.S. Data & Analytics Leader.
Monetizing the Internet of Things
The Internet of Things and its applications are one example of a mobile-driven growth opportunity. In the KPMG study, technology business leaders globally believed that retail/intelligent shopping (20 percent) has the greatest potential to generate revenue as a result of adoption of the Internet of Things, followed by home automation (14 percent), and surveillance/security and social interaction (both at 12 percent). Most U.S. survey respondents (22 percent) cited home automation while most China survey respondents (20 percent) said sustainable environment/waste management.
Industries that will experience greatest transformation
Given retail's revenue potential based on the Internet of Things, it follows that in the technology innovation study consumer markets was among the top five industries globally projected to experience the greatest transformation in the next three years as a result of emerging technologies. The five were technology (21 percent), consumer markets (12 percent), healthcare (11 percent) and automotive/transportation and manufacturing (tied at 10 percent). In the U.S., after technology (25 percent), more respondents cited healthcare (19 percent) than consumer markets (17 percent). In China, manufacturing (21 percent) was the industry cited most after technology (22 percent), and ahead of automotive (11 percent). However, the survey responses on this topic differed most in Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) compared to the global responses and views in other regions. In EMEA, the top four were technology (16 percent), followed by healthcare and energy (each at 12 percent), and aerospace and defense next (11 percent).
Digital currency
Digital currency (i.e. Bitcoin/Blockchain, etc.) is one of the emerging technologies that may impact a sector or an industry and whether they are adopted widely as payment in the next few years depends on the country or region. The percentage of respondents by region or country that said it is likely that digital currencies will disrupt banking and payments in the next three years: 15 percent U.S., 21 percent Americas, 32 percent EMEA, 39 percent globally, 53 percent Asia Pacific, and 70 percent China.
"Asia Pacific generally has been an early adopter of mobile payments and e-commerce and may be more comfortable using digital currency," said Edge Zarrella, KPMG China technology practice leader. "China is one of the innovators in the payments' sector especially in e-commerce. With the massive rise of the consumer in China, there are significant innovations taking place."
Challenges to tech innovation and commercialization
The KPMG technology innovation survey also captured the biggest challenges to innovation and commercialization. When asked which factors will limit/constrain innovation, more than one third(34 percent) of the tech business leaders globally said restrictive regulatory policies, while 29 percent cited consumer fatigue/pullback, and 27 percent said ability to demonstrate ROI. The order was similar by region, except in EMEA, where the ability to demonstrate ROI was second to restrictive regulatory policies.
Survey respondents globally said the top barriers to commercialize technology innovation were
security (27 percent), technology complexity (22 percent) and customer adoption (21 percent). Respondents in China listed their top three as technology complexity, security and risk management. Most EMEA tech business leaders selected customer adoption as the top barrier, followed by funding/access to capital and technology complexity.
"For enterprises and governments, tackling security and transparency issues will remain a priority even as next-gen cybersecurity solutions emerge to deal with this challenge. Tech companies, big and small, will continue to invest in the development and implementation of Information Security and IT risk management technologies to manage security issues proactively," said Richard Hanley, U.S. Advisory Industry Leader, KPMG Technology, Media and Telecommunications practice.
