The Year in Tech 2022

The COVID-19 pandemic rushed the world’s digitization and, with it, came inevitable changes and opportunities for companies and how they operate. Market players went through a natural selection process to become part of the new normal and those that failed to embrace digitization were left behind. As industries evolve, more opportunities arise for new players, provided they rely on tech penetration and adoption to properly take advantage of them. 

Seventy-five percent of companies worldwide are adopting automation, according to the Vodafone Business analysis “Fit For The Future.” Contrary to common belief, automation will not usurp jobs but rather optimize and transform them, states the analysis. More automation will require more high-skilled jobs and will promote continuous learning to keep up with company and social progress. Most companies have yet to automate their operations as thoroughly as technology allows, leaving them running data-driven processes with too many people, decades-old legacy systems and other costly infrastructure.

A data-driven business creates value and monetizes assets by making data central to the business, prioritizing robust analytics capabilities and supporting a systematic approach to data strategy, architecture, operations and execution, highlighted experts at Mexico Business Forum 2022 Echo. Harvesting and exploiting data through automation has allowed businesses to optimize their operations by creating new revenue sources and clearing a pathway to innovation. Data analysis can also make a company more productive, competitive and efficient, allowing organizations to reduce human error, avoid costly mistakes and save time and resources. “Data management allows for better decision making, helping us to focus on the customer and to boost innovation,” said Ingrid Avilés, Country Manager, Waze.

Capitalizing data can generate new business opportunities, increase sustainability and open the door to more markets. However, this transition can create potential weaknesses that expose the business to risks if done incorrectly. For that reason, data protection should not be treated as optional. “Data protection is a need for users, an obligation for companies and it needs to be based on a regulatory framework,” said Sergio Dueñas, Chief Digital and Growth Officer, GBM.

Along with technological tools, how businesses now build relationships with their customers has changed drastically. While the way people work has changed due to the automation of many tasks, companies are still managing teams and coming up with products, marketing campaigns and designing things for humans. Clients demand a human touch in the products they buy, and, at the end of the day, these products are designed to improve people’s everyday experience, as mentioned by Hugo Freytes, Country Manager for Mexico, Salesforce, to MBN. Despite the numerous challenges posed by digitization, customer experience has to be kept at the center of everything. Retailers must also face the blurring lines between the physical and digital worlds to map how this new way of living will affect the future of shopping. To address customer needs, the lines between the online and offline world must disappear to offer a complete experience. Technology should also be seen as the catalyst that drives people to physical stores.

Altogether, cloud computing is a leverageable asset that allows companies to transform the customer experience, increase their market reach, discover additional business avenues and reconfigure business models accordingly. The agility and flexibility of cloud services have allowed Mexican companies to adapt their business models to the undeniable rise of a digital economy boosted by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The market transformation has also led people to seek alternatives to traditional banking as a way to access all the benefits offered by digitization. Mexican fintechs are emerging as one of the main powers in the Latin American startup boom. In general, investments in the fintech sector are focused on developing financial inclusion, resulting in more deals being generated in regions such as Africa, Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. This preference also increases the likelihood of birthing new unicorn companies in these regions. Given this scenario, it is important to identify and take advantage of the opportunities that arise around fintech and how different technologies will impact the development of this sector. 

According to KPMG, over the next three years, the financial sector is expected to adopt emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (46 percent), data and analytics (41 percent), blockchain (34 percent) and application programming interfaces or APIs (31 percent). In addition, the areas of the financial sector that will be most impacted by fintech over the next three years are lending and financing (53 percent), customer experience (49 percent), payments (48 percent), investment (asset and wealth management, 27 percent) and deposits (22 percent).

Senior management in the financial sector, according to KPMG, considers that customer experience (49 percent), the use of fintech technology (46 percent) and new business models (41 percent) are the main disruptors of this industry. “Without a doubt, fintechs are addressing challenges that clients had when looking for financial products and services, as these companies are investing time and resources to cater specifically to their users. In the end, this could benefit traditional banking, due to the evident value that fintechs can bring as allies to the financial sector in the acceleration of the digital transformation,” says Maricarmen García, Consulting Partner in Financial Risk Administration, KPMG México.