crucial. Both to maximize the efficiency of what they already have and to become more agile and responsive in highly unpredictable conditions, technology is the key enabler.” Although investment remains strong in cloud (63 percent reporting large-scale usage), companies are cutting their investment back in other technologies that are key to innovation and to gaining a competitive advantage. Amid the investment in the cloud, more than a third (41 percent) of digital leaders report the cloud creates security headaches because of complexities it can create, especially for large, distributed organizations, according to the report. The report also shows that 52 percent of the largest organizations (total IT budget of more than $250 million), recorded a major cyber-attack in the last two years. Meanwhile, global unrest and a growing awareness of the politicization around cyber warfare has led to more than a third of digital leaders (40 percent) fearing an attack from foreign powers. In retrospect, only 12 percent of those leaders believed it could happen just five years ago. “An area that truly demands ongoing investment is cybersecurity,” White said. “The threat environment is highly charged, and the rise in concerns about foreign power activity is striking. The world has become a more dangerous place in 2022. Businesses must take robust defensive steps accordingly.” The report also found that a shortage of cyber talent continues to be a significant issue for digital leaders. Cyber skills are the second most sought after technology skill in the world. This shortage and the increasing cyber threat have left less than a third (29 percent) of digital leaders feeling confident they have all reasonable risks covered. Indeed, the war for talent and keeping pay demands reasonable emerges as a big challenge. Seventy percent of digital leaders state that a skills shortage prevents them from keeping up with the pace of change, the largest percentage ever recorded. Sixty-two percent think organizations never will have enough technology staff and a similar number (60 percent) feel the rising cost of living has made salary demands unsustainable. Government policies aren’t helping, as a staggering 74 percent of digital leaders feel their government’s policies are ineffective at tackling the skills shortage. “Businesses run on people – but the technology sector simply can’t find enough of them,” White explained. “While the skills shortages afflicting the sector are nothing new, it is a concern that they’re worsening rather than getting better. However, what we see in our research is that organizations are taking innovative steps to ease the challenges.” Interestingly enough, robotic process automation increasingly is a way to plug BUYERS SIDE Change in Emerging Tech Spend Implementations 2022 2021 YoY Chg Quantum computing 5% 3% 2% Cloud 89% 90% -1% Blockchain/Distributed ledger 8% 9% -1% Augmented/virtual reality 12% 13% -1% AI/Machine learning 33% 37% -4% IoT 33% 38% -5% On-demand marketplace platforms 26% 33% -7% Robotic process automation 34% 42% -8% Big data/Analytics 55% 65% -10% Source: Nash Squared ‘Digital Leadership Report 2022’ Source: Avasant Research Power shoppers are adopting marketplaces at an accelerated rate Source: Mirakl The Technology Maturity Matrix Source: Nash Squared ‘Digital Leadership Report 2022’ 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% % of shopping done on marketplaces Power shopper : consumers that shop online once a week or more Average Consumer Power Shopper France Australia UK Spain U.S. Italy Singapore Cloud Big data/analytics Internet of Things Robotic process automation On-demand marketplace platforms Artificial intelligence/ machine learning Augmented reality/virtual reality Quantum computing Blockchain/distributed ledger Metaverse 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100% 4% 10% 55% 19% 15% 10% 81% 11% 65% 19% 72% 18% 37% 18% 13% 21% 12% 33% 40% 20% 14% 17% 9% 23% 25% 19% 26% 7% 4% 9% 6% 6%3% 3% 19% 14% 24% 10% 18% 17% 32% 23% 5% 26% 63% Have not considered Actively considering Piloting Small-scale Large-scale 34% 34% 34% 16 CHANNELV ISION | JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2023
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