Were you unable to attend Transform 2022? Check out all of the summit sessions in our on-demand library now! Retailers and convenience stores have increasingly invested heavily in technology, especially mobile applications, that enable customers to do much of the shopping legwork from home. Are autonomous stores the next big thing in retail tech? Chris Hartman, senior director of fuels, forecourt, advertising and construction at Rutter's, thinks so.

The disparity between digital transformation leaders and laggards stems from a complex web of overlapping factors -- which often speak more to organizational issues than technical difficulties. Considerations in play include corporate history, IT philosophy, the ability to deliver on customer experience and a product vs. project mindset. A particularly important element separating a successful digital business from its competitors is a knack for translating small successes into enterprise-wide benefits. Indeed, overcoming digital transformation challenges at scale is crucial for realizing the promise of technology-infused business models, according to CIOs and industry analysts. Companies playing catch-up in the digital race must first focus on the essentials, such as customer experience, before moving on to more innovative pursuits.

Algorithmic trading now dominates the derivative, equity, and foreign exchange trading markets. These trading strategies can be complex, but the essentials are straightforward: program a set of rules that takes market data as input and apply basic models (10 -day moving average) to generate an automated trade workflow. Over the years, these strategies have moved beyond simple time-series momentum and mean revision models to more exotic name strategies like snipes, slicers, and boxers. Evolved over decades, algorithm trading has replaced much of the manual trade order flow with faster static rules-based strategies. What was once cutting edge is now an inherent disadvantage.

The coronavirus outbreak forced companies around the world to adjust to a new reality that is itself still under construction. Although economies are timidly reopening, they do so while keeping an eye on the epidemiologic evolution to shape accordingly. And even though the future is still unknown, one thing is sure: as people adjust to this "new normal", where the most mundane activities move to the online sphere, technology adoption will continue to skyrocket. This poses opportunities for businesses to develop new digital strategies and even find new business streams. Still, it also entails a few challenges and risks that executives should keep in mind.

In the years since the term "digital business" emerged, so too has our understanding of digital maturity. As it turns out, you don't get to the right-hand side of the maturity curve by merely collecting and using operational data to make business decisions. Companies now have access to entirely new categories of more meaningful data: unstructured data, Internet of Things (IoT) data, images, social data and more. Still, high data volumes do not equal digital maturity. Businesses need to know which data matters, and they need to be able to access and use it to operate with precision.

Fourteen years ago, one of us (Davenport) wrote an article about how companies were beginning to compete on analytics. In the years that followed, data and analytics seemed to become embedded in business culture. Whether these tools were called analytics, big data, or artificial intelligence, organizations of all sizes and types supposedly embraced these resources as a way to improve decision-making and enhance offerings. How to explain, then, a recent Deloitte survey of U.S. executives that found that only 10% of companies are competing on their analytical insights, and that the most popular tool for analyzing data -- used by 62% of companies responding to the survey -- is the spreadsheet? Our survey results clearly show that analytical competitors represent a minority of businesses today, despite the number of years technologies like big data and analytics have been readily available.

Over the past year, companies unable to properly embrace digital technologies lost 15% in foregone annual revenue, a study from Accenture finds. Looking forward, lagging-technology companies stand to potentially miss out on 46% in revenue gains over the next three to four years. This is one of the takeaways from a study based on data from 8,300 organizations, published by Accenture, which sought to document the financial impact of technology adoption. The study finds that leaders grow revenue at more than twice the rate of laggards – tech-savvy organizations grew at a rate of none percent over the past three years, compared to 4% for laggards. The survey's authors--Bhaskar Ghosh, Adam Burden and James Wilson, all with Accenture--add that it's not just about installing the latest systems and gadgets, but also about mindsets and behaviors.

A vast new research survey on Future Systems from Accenture (NYSE: ACN) sheds important light on the enormous impact that technology investment and adoption have on a company's financial performance and most notably, the mindsets and behaviors of companies that are industry leaders. The new research, titled: "Full Value. How to scale innovation and achieve full value with Future Systems," provides insights on how to scale innovation and achieve full value of technology investments, builds on Accenture's initial Future Systems report launched last year, and is based on a survey of more than 8,300 organizations across 20 industries and 22 countries. It is designed to help companies understand and close the innovation achievement gap – defined as the difference between potential and realized value from technology investments. The Future Systems research is Accenture's largest enterprise IT survey ever conducted and includes measures of both mature and emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, and extended reality.

This ebook, based on the latest ZDNet / TechRepublic special feature, looks at the outlook for business leaders in 2020 and where they are spending their tech dollars. Companies that fail to scale innovation may lose up to $20 billion in revenue over the next five years as enterprises thrive or dive based on information technology decisions, according to Accenture. Accenture's report was based on a survey of more than 8,300 companies across 20 industries and 22 countries. Accenture scored companies on technology adoption, depth of technology adoption and cultural readiness. From there, Accenture segmented companies into leaders, defined as the top 10%, and laggards, which represent the bottom 25%.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are crucial to modern-day business success, which is why nearly 60% of organizations have deployed AI, according to Gartner's recent Survey Analysis: AI and ML Development Strategies, Motivators and Adoption Challenges. AI projects are predicted to grow, resulting in an increase in AI staffing numbers in the next three years, KPMG's AI Transforming the Enterprise report added. However, the number of AI-specific employees aren't the only ones expected increase, PMI's Pulse of the Profession survey reported on Thursday. As the number of AI projects increase, so do the number of individuals managing those projects: Over the next three years, 27% of respondents said AI will lead to the creation of more project management jobs. "While there's a fear that AI will replace jobs, AI has – and will continue – to open up opportunities for project managers," said Mike DePrisco, PMI's vice president of global solutions.