Report

Wipro: How Retailers and Brands Drive Revenue and Growth with Cloud

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Digital technologies and evolving customer behaviors have driven tremendous change among retailers and consumer brands during the past decade, but the pace of disruption has increased since 2020. Mobile adoption and eCommerce are reshaping the retail and CPG sectors, forcing them to make a big shift to become “digital-first” industries. In this new reality, a growing portion of customer engagement, transactions, and operations happens in the cloud.

These changes present opportunities, but they also come with challenges. Many retailers were already struggling with low margins, increasing competition, faster fulfillment, and pressure to drive more sales through digital channels. Meanwhile, consumer brands were trying to navigate customers’ demands for personalization, more-sustainable options, and several manufacturing and supply chain constraints.

Both sectors now face an urgent need to rapidly reinvent their business. Cloud investments can enable this transformation, allowing retailers and consumer brands to address these challenges while increasing their revenue and accelerating their growth.

Wipro FullStride Cloud Services surveyed 1,400 global executives, including 123 consumer brands and 136 retailers in six countries, with revenues ranging from less than $5 billion to $20 billion or more. Our research showed that cloud leaders in the retail and consumer-brand industries are thriving and expanding through their cloud adoption. Whereas cloud beginners in the retail and CPG sectors are struggling to achieve a return on investment, leaders are achieving an average ROI of about 100%.

This report explores the best practices of those retail and consumer-brand cloud leaders, and three key characteristics they share that others can follow. First, they leverage the cloud to create a future-ready business strategy and drive revenue. Second, they use the cloud to improve the customer experience and enhance their employee experience and productivity. And third, they look to the cloud to create intelligent and interconnected operations.

By following these best practices, other retailers and consumer brands can make the big shift and position themselves to thrive in their industries’ cloud-everywhere future.

Insights shared in this report are based on a survey conducted for Wipro in June and July 2021 by ThoughtLab Group to analyze current and future patterns of enterprise-level cloud adoption. Respondents included 1,400 executives at organizations with annual revenue from less than $5 billion to $20 billion or more. They are located in six countries (Australia, France, Germany, Switzerland, U.K., and the U.S.) and come from 11 industries (banking, capital markets, consumer packaged goods, healthcare providers, insurance, life sciences, manufacturing, oil and gas, retail, transportation, and utilities). All respondents are responsible for or play a key role in their cloud strategy and implementation. Additional insights come from responses to open-ended questions.

To calculate cloud maturity, we analyzed three criteria: (1) a company’s progress implementing cloud-based data centers, migrating and modernizing core processes, and adopting cloud-native applications; (2) the percentage of total applications operating in the cloud; and (3) the number of advanced technologies used in conjunction with the cloud. Based on those criteria, we classified the top 19% of respondents as cloud “leaders,” the middle 49% as “intermediate users,” and the other 32% as “beginners.”

Wipro: Powering Cloud Innovation in the Energy and Utilities Industry

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In the energy and utilities industry, the cloud is being recognized as a critical tool for transforming business operations beyond the framework of IT. Enterprises now view cloud technologies as a vital component for not only modernizing tech operations, but gaining valuable market insights, enabling greater agility, and driving sustainability efforts. Energy and utilities companies’ approach to adopting cloud technologies has been deliberate and purpose-driven, and their initiatives are delivering benefits across their organizations.

However, according to recent Wipro FullStride Cloud Services research, the industry in general is still working toward taking full advantage of what the cloud has to offer, and it has achieved lower levels of cloud maturity in comparison to other industries. But this appears to be changing, with significant numbers of energy and utilities companies now accelerating their cloud journeys.

The research has gauged the progress companies have made in four key areas: establishing cloud-based data centers, migrating core processes to the cloud, modernizing core processes, and using cloud-native applications. To provide more insight into the specifics of the industry’s efforts, the research identifies three categories of companies’ cloud maturity: beginners, intermediates (or advancers), and leaders.

The industry has a lower percentage of cloud leaders and intermediates relative to other industries and, accordingly, a higher percentage of beginners that are in the early stages of cloud maturity. Leaders are those that have made progress across a broad range of areas, including cybersecurity, transmission and distribution, and market analysis. They have also seen higher increases in revenue (4.36% vs. 3.95% for beginners) and better ROI (98% vs. 35%), and they have high expectations for future benefits in many areas, including better use of capital, increased revenue, and accelerated time to market. Although energy and utilities companies are typically larger than other organizations covered in Wipro’s cloud research, their spending on cloud initiatives trails that of other industries, both in absolute dollars ($592.3 million vs. $731.6 million) and as a percentage of revenue (2.43% vs. 3.45%). In addition, these companies as a whole spend less of their IT budgets on the cloud than firms in other industries (5% vs. 6%).

The insights shared in this report are based on a survey conducted for Wipro between June and September 2021 by ThoughtLab to analyze the current and future patterns of enterprise-level cloud adoption. The overall respondents were organizations ranging in size from less than $5 billion in annual revenue to more than $20 billion, with the largest share in the midsized category. The survey included 108 utility companies and 115 oil and gas companies located in Australia, France, Germany, Switzerland, the U.K., and the U.S. The largest portion of respondents were chief technology officers, (16%) followed by chief executive officers and chief operations officers (both 13%), heads of business units (11%) and chief financial officers (9%). The remainder included chiefs of digital, strategy, information, innovation, products, or cloud activities.

To calculate cloud maturity, we analyzed each company to determine the cloud progress it is making, the percentage of applications it operates in the cloud , and the number of advanced technologies it uses in conjunction with the cloud. Based on those criteria, we classified 14% of oil and gas respondents as cloud leaders, 43% as intermediates (or advancers), and 43% as beginners. Among utilities respondents, 13% were leaders, 45% were intermediates, and 42% were beginners.

 

 

ServiceNow Workflow Quarterly: This Way Out, Leadership lessons for uncertain times

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According to a global study of C-level leaders from ServiceNow and ThoughtLab, 70% of executives worldwide are optimistic about the future but concerned about the near term impact of inflation, cyberattacks, and rising energy costs.

To stay ahead of competitors and be ready when the economy improves, more than 70% of companies are planning to increase digital innovation investments in the next year—in fact, 40% say it is a top strategic priority. Almost as many plan to invest in customer experiencerelated tech. Leaders generally plan to focus their investments on cloud, Internet of Things, cybersecurity, and advanced data managements, although priorities vary by industry. Digital leaders also plan to invest in emerging technologies, including RegTech, blockchain, digital twins, and augmented reality.

Visa: Reimagining ridership: Open-loop payments and the future of urban mobility

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Around the world, cities are taking decisive steps to help make their urban mobility ecosystems frictionless, sustainable, and inclusive. For many of them, implementing contactless, open-loop payment systems is a crucial part of this process. This paper presents results from a survey of 75 transit agencies and 3,000 transit riders from cities around the globe, and concludes that contactless, open-loop payments help to reduce carbon emissions and promote financial inclusion—among other important benefits.

Digital payment in transportation networks can be implemented on open-loop or closed-loop systems. Openloop payment systems use international standards and universal technology to enable payments at most transit providers. Closed-loop systems are limited to particular providers and usually apply specific standards and proprietary technology.

To understand the benefits of open-loop systems, the Visa Economic Empowerment Institute (VEEI) partnered with ThoughtLab, a global research firm, to survey 75 transit agencies and 3,000 transit riders from cities around the globe. Together, we found that transit systems offering contactless, open-loop payments provide widespread benefits to riders, agencies, and cities. Among other benefits, 80 percent of transit agencies in our survey that had already implemented these systems saw increased ridership following adoption. Agencies that had adopted open-loop payments less than two years ago saw an average total increase of 6 percent, while agencies with two or more years of experience saw an average increase of 10 percent. This paper explores the findings of our survey, and concludes that contactless, openloop payments help to reduce carbon emissions and promote financial inclusion.

PwC: ESG Empowered Value Chains 2025

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ESG Champions embrace operational transformation. ESG is no longer a nicety; it’s a necessity. Customers demand it; investors require it; regulators are making it law. Still, most companies, while stating ambitious goals, have been slow to act. Transformation is costly and burdensome, and economic stresses are slowing efforts. But where many companies see challenges, some see opportunities.

Like with digitization – a period of massive transformation characterized by high costs and uncertainty – there are big benefits to transforming without delay. Companies that digitized early, learned from mistakes and moved forward. Those that waited, are now investing heavily to catch up. We think it’s better to be an ESG Champion than a follower.”

Stefan Schrauf, EMEA Operations Lead at PwC Germany

The PwC Global ESG in Operations Survey of mostly large corporations shows many leaders think the same. Appearing to be green isn’t enough. To be competitive, operations must be reengineered to meet wide-ranging ESG standards. There is a subset of ESG champions emerging that enjoys top management support, has a clear strategy and vision and balanced focus on all ESG aspects. They rethink the end to end value chain and with that made their business more resilient for the future challenges. Those who lag behind need to speed up their ESG transformation to not lose ground.

Broadridge: The Imperative to Improve the First Experience

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Create a customer-centric model that inspires prospects to sign on and stay on. 

The wealth management industry is in the midst of considerable disruption. User-friendly, online robo-advisors and self-service capabilities have increased the imperative for wealth managers to leverage technology to simplify and improve the client experience, especially for onboarding—the process of opening and funding accounts. 

However, too few firms automate tasks that should be digitally enabled and as a result, they run the risk of missing opportunities and falling behind. 

Onboarding is particularly important because it is the client’s first meaningful experience of the firm in action; but it is often hindered by confusing forms, a lack of transparency and a lengthy time to completion. Advisors say the process is too manual, has too many handoffs and is prone to frequently changing compliance requirements. Investors also complain that it’s an onerous, outdated and time-consuming process. 

Polling data reveals that the vast majority of firms have prioritized improving the onboarding process as top of their technology wish list. So, what makes a great onboarding platform? Investors want not only the simplicity and ease of low-cost automated investing (i.e. robo-advisor) offerings but also the “bells and whistles” of a full-service advisor. Wealth firms want a better client experience but, more crucially, want a process that funds accounts faster. 

Like many important technology-based decisions, executives must first answer the perennial question: Build or buy? This paper assesses those options and finds that a growing number of wealth managers are partnering with vendors to join shared onboarding platforms in order to upgrade their onboarding technology, benefit from a network of users and mutualize the cost of keeping up with regulatory changes. 

ThoughtLab’s research is referenced in this report.