New to the top five of disruptive technologies over the next three years is 3-D printing, Internet of Things (IoT), and biotech/ healthcare IT, 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.
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.
"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," 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,” Matuzak added. “Tech innovation creates an opportunity to drive incremental customer value and monetize new business models resulting from disruptive technologies."
Monetizing the Internet of Things
The Internet of Things and its applications are one example of a mobile-driven growth opportunity. The study showed that technology business leaders globally believed that retail/intelligent shopping (20%) has the greatest potential to generate revenue as a result of adoption of the Internet of Things, followed by home automation (14%), and surveillance/security and social interaction (both at 12%). Most U.S. survey respondents (22%) cited home automation while most China survey respondents (20%) 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%), consumer markets (12%), healthcare (11%) and automotive/transportation and manufacturing (tied at 10%).
In the U.S., after technology (25%), more respondents cited healthcare (19%) than consumer markets (17%). In China, manufacturing (21%) was the industry cited most after technology (22%), and ahead of automotive (11%). 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%), followed by healthcare and energy (each at 12%), and aerospace and defense next (11%).
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%) of the tech business leaders globally said restrictive regulatory policies, while 29% cited consumer fatigue/pullback, and 27% 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%), technology complexity (22%) and customer adoption (21%). 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.