95% of companies don't see full benefits of digitization

Dive Brief:

Of 350 supply chain and operations professionals surveyed, 95% believe they haven't seen the benefits of digitization, according to a DHL report.
Respondents told DHL two big reasons for the lack of results are 1) "New technology is developing so quickly that businesses find it challenging to keep up with innovations and best practices," and 2) "organizational challenges" prevent technology from being implemented properly, efficiently and effectively.
The report also noted 73% of the respondents are investing in Big Data analytics, 63% in cloud-based applications and robotics, 54% in internet-of-things (IoT) solutions, 51% in blockchain, 46% in machine learning, 40% in autonomous vehicles (AVs), 34% in the sharing economy, 33% in 3-D printing and 28% in augmented reality and drones.

According to the DHL report, many companies are investing in new tech but most aren't seeing the benefits yet.

Kate Patrick / Supply Chain Dive

Dive Insight:

It's one thing to be aware of the latest tech trends and to understand the probable future of your industry, but it's quite another to implement the changes necessary. If companies don't use a top-down approach to implementing and keeping up with new technology, they're going to fall behind.

As research shows, companies are interested in a lot of the new buzzy tech that many argue is the future of supply chains: artificial intelligence, AVs, automation and blockchain. Most of the companies surveyed by DHL are investing in at least two of those, so it's clear companies believe further exploration and investment in these technologies are critical to their success.

What is still lacking is the implementation: a staggering 95% of the companies surveyed admitted they haven't seen the benefits of these technologies. However, this admission still doesn't necessarily suggest there's something wrong with the technology, only with the way companies go about implementation.

It could be that companies simply don't have the resources and the manpower to implement efficiently and effectively. Or it could be that implementation is not a company-wide, top-down, cohesive effort. Recent news about McCormick and General Electric show that top-down approaches to big company changes are usually the best way to transform how business is done.

These technologies are fairly new so it is premature to judge how well companies are implementing them. But going forward, some of the new tech may lose popularity — blockchain, for example — if companies consistently can't find good use cases for them.