Industry leaders reflect back on the year 2021, prepare to welcome 2022

Industry leaders from across different verticals share their learnings from the year 2021, and state predictions for 2022

The year 2021 has almost come to an end. The year was undoubtedly remarkable for all the ups and downs it brought with it along with a lesson on business continuity for almost all businesses across verticals. Industry leaders from pre-eminent organisations shared their views on what they learnt from the year 2021, and what the IT industry must look forward to in the upcoming year. 

Arvind Bali, CEO, Telecom Sector Skill Council

As India is entering into global tie-ups and executing big-ticket projects like the PLI scheme, 5G launch, Smart Cities project, PM WANI project and BharatNet project, we are seeing an increased requirement for skilled manpower in all segments of the telecom sector. When it comes to futuristic technologies like 5G, IoT, Cloud Computing, ML/AI, and others, the industry will need a fresh batch of industry-certified skilled manpower which can tackle both the volume and technicality of the work involved. Additionally, India is also poised to become a global talent export hub and we need to actively engage both the rural and urban youth to create smart, sophisticated flag bearers for this initiative.

Spokesperson  - Lt. Gen. AK Bhatt (Retd), Director General, Indian Space Association (ISpA)

Roll out of Spacecom Policy would bring in significant opportunities for Space Communication segment, specially the Space based broad-band, wherein LEO Satellites with low latency would help address connectivity challenges of far-flung areas and Rural India.

Agendra Kumar, Managing Director, Esri India

As we welcome 2022, a wave of concern due to the new strain of COVID-19 yet again reiterates - the importance of being “geo-aware” to contextualize environmental, social, and economic systems for a safer and healthier society, and emphasizes the significance of “Preparing Strategically, Responding Rapidly and Recovering Methodically”.  In spite of numerous challenges, 2021 has been a landmark year for the geospatial industry. While on one side the “geo-awareness” and “spatial thinking” surged to all time high, we also witnessed major strides by the government through new policies like Geospatial Data Guidelines, Drone Policy, Draft National Geospatial Policy 2021, among others. These make 2022 look very promising and as the geospatial technologies get subsumed into the enterprise IT architectures, GIS takes centre stage in new converged environments to help organizations unearth better economic, social, and environmental value and higher return on their investments. Technological advances have pushed geospatial applications to newer heights, especially in the year 2021. While the technology supercharged normal business intelligence with a geographic component that allowed a holistic situational awareness, providing real-time insights into operations and systems, it also enabled us to fight COVID-19, from an interdisciplinary perspective, with proactive planning, international solidarity and a global perspective. Now, as the geospatial technologies are getting subsumed into the enterprise IT architectures, GISl is taking centre stage in new converged environments to help organizations unearth better economic, social, and environmental value and higher returns on their investments. The rapid rate of GIS adoption in the past year has indeed laid a strong foundation for the dawn of a new “Geo-Enabled Era” that will foster inclusivity, sustainability, and resilience in the future.

Rajiv Bhalla, MD, Barco India

The year 2021 will always stand out as the year organisations and people adapted to the hybrid lifestyle. The beginning of a disruptive new decade marked by innovative solutions, technological advancements, and resilient organisations driven by visionary leaders, 2021 taught us many lessons. The tech industry has outdone itself, designing new solutions to take on even the most insidious of pandemic challenges and we should hold these lessons close as we move into the new year. The pandemic has highlighted one thing, for sure, an organisation is only as effective as its employees, and leaders must adopt a people-first approach in all their policies. As we embark on another revolution around the sun, let us put our heads together and work towards solutions which are sustainable and responsible. 2021 is the year we learned to adapt, let 2022 be the year we flourish as we focus unwaveringly on business resilience and optimal leadership.       

Rajesh Dhuddu, VP & Practice Leader Blockchain and Cybersecurity Tech Mahindra

The accelerated integration of technology in business operations and workflows, along with increased adoption of Work from Home (WFH) model, have resulted in a surge in cyberthreats and attacks.  Malicious threats from outside and within organizations, coupled with increasingly stringent data regulations, have made cybersecurity a C-suite level issue. Acknowledging this, organizations are focusing on re-evaluating their IT strategy ensuring an end-to-end, robust, and strategic infrastructure design based on Zero trust architecture to improve overall infrastructure security posture of business and network security lifecycles alike. Using low-code automation to harness collective knowledge and form a secure, centralized system of data records, to simplify operational systems and enable a cohesive view of things, is rapidly becoming the functional norm.

Rohit Khetan, Head Marketing and Strategy, Ginesys

The retail landscape will continue to evolve at a rapid pace in 2022. Post pandemic challenges and opportunities will be technology-driven with a deeper and real-time understanding of consumer trends and demand. Digitization has led to an increase in demand for integration of offline retail stores or pre-integration and online web stores and channels for a better omnichannel experience. Another trend we foresee is the gradual democratization of retail intelligence to benefit mid-size companies and SMEs. Increasingly people are using AI to drive customer behaviour at scale leveraging digital footprints. This includes using interest and social media footprints to subtly push customers to try certain products/ webstores. Industry data suggests that marketers will see an average increase of 10-20% in sales when using personalized experiences. Digital payments across retail formats like UPI are now at around 10% of retail transactions and only growing. Combined with credit cards, this is set to eclipse cash as the payment system of choice. Last but not the least, self-checkout is going to be a much-implemented feature across mid to large stores as costs to deploy this technology gradually reduce.

Neetish Sarda, Founder Smartworks 

Managed office spaces will continue to grow, given the value, agility, and flexibility it offers to the occupiers. The year started slowly, but the demand for fully managed office spaces gradually increased, with us signing major multi-city deals with large companies. We also added close to a million sq. ft. area to our overall portfolio. With hybrid offices and work arrangements taking centre stage, managed office spaces have gained significant popularity and have become an integrated part of portfolio strategy for enterprises.2022 will see a complete transformation of offices into smart and dynamic spaces that incorporate the latest technologies to facilitate better workspace management and experience with data-driven decisions. Office experience has become more critical in the ‘new normal’ than ever, so a lot of focus will be on implementing the right tech solutions in workspaces for real-time insights on space optimisation and utilisation, leading to overall efficiency.

Anku Jain, Managing Director, MediaTek India.

MediaTek expects 2022 to be a year of disruptive technological advancements. We are eyeing an array of developments, from the possibility of 5G deployment and spread of Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things to the continued boom in the semiconductor industry and quicker proliferation of smart devices. As a global fabless semiconductor company powering nearly 2 billion devices per year and spearheading technology democratization, we are keen to be at the forefront of this revolution. We expect the pandemic-accelerated momentum in technology to continue in 2022 and believe that semiconductors will be at the heart of transformative progress across industries.

Om Narayan Rai, Head-Enterprise Business Solutions and Academia Relations, Mytat

Pandemic brought us to speedy automation and of course, it transformed the way businesses are conducted and the way the human race stands to the biggest challenge to life. It also brought the focus of the world on the challenges of Mental well-being and also the struggle of working women and their progress. While Skilling and upskilling are going to be the buzzwords for 2022, they will also mark the beginning of the human potential expansion age. Recent industry reports indicate that in order to meet the growing demand for new-age technology talent a majority of India's workforce will require reskilling in the coming months. To expand the existing digital talent pool and capitalise on digital transformation initiatives there is a need to effectively integrate cutting edge technologies such as AI, ML, AR & VR, innovation and R&D to enable next-generation immersive experiences. Along with these skills, interpersonal skills, communication, leading self and others with a focus on Diversity and Inclusion will play a vital role in building Atma Nirbhar Bharat.

Mahesh Zurale, Senior Managing Director, Lead – Advanced Technology Centers in India (ATCI), Accenture

The pandemic has accelerated the adoption of digital technologies, compressing a decade of digital transformation into just a few months and igniting a new era of exponential transformation. As technologies like AI, automation and low code platforms gain traction in the workplace, organizations need to reinvent their strategies and work style to successfully navigate the road ahead. First, cloud will continue to be a key growth enabler and organizations will need to prioritize managing and optimizing hybrid cloud environments, and charting the right cloud migration strategy to fast-track 5G and Edge deployments. With technology becoming more accessible to people across the organization, it will enable better synchronization between IT and business departments to build better solutions aligned to business needs. This will help companies to gain an innovation advantage that best positions them for future success. We also foresee the emergence of “network-effect,” with platforms that will help create new business models and build strategic partnerships between large companies in the ecosystem. Finally, a major focus area for companies in 2022 will be worker upskilling and collaboration so that their people can become a core part of their digital transformation journey.