Huge transformations have swept across the manufacturing landscape, challenging traditional processes and operations. Success will depend on manufacturers’ ability to up their game, and this will only be achieved through the implementation of new technologies. Bill Moffett speaks with Jacqui Griffiths in latest issue of The Record about how we are to navigate and lead digital transformation successfully, ensuring that our culture is ready to engage and learn in order to thrive.

“The manufacturing industry is shifting its focus from building products as standalone offerings to providing services that enhance existing products, doing so manufacturers are not only providing a product but nurturing a relationship that is built on feedback and trust. This has become increasingly important as the expectation for mass customisation has become the norm. Manufacturers need the flexibility to create customised products for a segment of one if they are to succeed.”

We also hear from industry Partners Iconics, Metafile, Dassault Systemes and Driveworks in this feature, providing anecdotal evidence of how the Partner community is playing its part in this future vision.

“Technologies like mixed reality, AI, machine learning and IoT are integral components of an intelligent manufacturing future,” says Moffett. “Each manufacturer has unique needs, and as the competitive arena continues to evolve they need the agility to respond quickly to opportunities and create new business models. Microsoft’s network of partners has the deep industry expertise to leverage these technologies to deliver specific business outcomes, with solutions that combine the best thinking from manufacturing experts and Microsoft software engineers.”

You can read the full feature article, plus a number of other industry stories from the Microsoft Partner community, in the latest issue of The Record here.

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Steve van den Heever, group sales director financial services at Dimension Data, notes that banks are increasingly looking to leverage collaboration technologies to reduce costs, enhance the customer experience and improve services. “The cost to service a client on mobile is less than 10 cents compared to over US$4.25 for a traditional branch visit,” says van den Heever. “Mobile offers more convenience and personalization in the client’s real-world banking and retail experiences, driven primarily by location, Internet of Things, data intelligence and collaboration. Mobile devices immediately deliver client benefits in terms of convenience, lifestyle apps, image capture and social awareness capabilities. These collectively provide a compelling business case to prioritize transforming not only the customer channel, but the end-to-end process to enable a more seamless business model in the future.”

As consumers demand more convenient ways to manage their money, banks are increasingly focused on delivering a mobile-enabled self-serve model – but legacy investments can present a challenge. “Research shows that customers would prefer to move their money using their bank’s technology rather than a third-party app,” says Lori Murray, worldwide bank offering director at Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE). “Banks are looking to develop apps that enable customers to open accounts, apply for loans and transfer payments. However, their legacy technology can make it difficult to deliver their core applications on a mobile device. We developed our framework to help them achieve that, so they can deliver the experience today’s users need without having to replace their legacy systems.”

HPE provides a framework – using Microsoft technologies such as Enterprise Management Suite, Windows 10 and Azure – to deliver end-to-end or individual solutions that can integrate with the bank’s legacy technologies. These include a lending solution that enables banks to provide mobile apps for two-tap loan applications, the Digital Enterprise Branch Transformation solution which helps to pull banks through to an integrated, digital experience, and the Continuum network which enables users to plug into the television or other large screen as well as using smartphones and tablets.

A user-focused approach is key to delivering this. “Mobility is about much more than the device,” says Enda Curran, mobile solutions business development lead at HPE. “It’s about the application, how it’s accessed, by whom, where, and how their data is secured. For example, Microsoft Azure is enabling new ways to interact with different users, whether they are customers or employees. We work with our clients and their users to design an application, to make sure we understand how they’re going to use it, what will drive adoption and usage, and how to ensure that it provides the user with data or notifications that are relevant to them.”

With the right mobile solutions in place, bankers can effectively take the branch to the customer. “Capabilities such as encryption, remote identity management and digital signatures mean that bankers with a mobile device are no longer locked to their desk,” says Marquez. “Apps such as Cortana Intelligence Suite leverage machine learning to create predictive models so they can recommend the next best conversation to have with a customer. When they need input from an expert, bankers can use Skype for Business to bring the right persona into their discussion with the customer. They can use digital signatures to conclude any transactions securely on the spot. Teams of bankers and investors can meet and share notes across the world using Surface Hub. This capability for paperless operation is transforming banks and making them much more efficient.”

Dimension Data works with global banking organizations to enable seamless collaboration and communication between employees, service providers and customers. For example, a Skype for Business branch advisor solution implementation at a leading Australian bank has resulted in increased customer satisfaction with access to expert lending and financial advisors, improved reach through video-conferencing, and streamlined collaboration between employees.

“Collaboration technology across mobile devices is having a significant impact in enabling banks to meet the needs of customers in remote locations,” says van den Heever. “In particular, mobile payments and wallets are poised for massive growth. We are also seeing increasing interest in delivering a compelling and personalized digital experience to clients, combining data intelligence at the client point of contact, social gamification and converged collaboration.”

Banks that embrace a persona-driven mobile strategy are poised to work smarter, and to reach more customers, than ever before. “We are moving into an era of persona-driven technology and services,” concludes Marquez. “Technology that used to be cost-prohibitive is now mainstream, enabling banks to provide any capability. That could be low-cost, GPS-enabled devices that enable microfinance loan collectors to visit customers in remote locations, or developing bot advisors that will provide the next generation of user interface on customers’ devices. The key to success lies in knowing who is using the technology, and delivering the apps and information that gives each user the experience they need.”

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Improving productivity and efficiency is at the top of the agenda for banks as they negotiate an environment of intense economic, regulatory and competitive pressure. Connecting the talent and resources that exist across the organization has become front of mind for banks as they look to enable new ways of collaborative working that can transform the way they do business.

“Efficiency and organizational leverage are key concerns for banks right now,” says Peter Hazou, director of business development for financial services at Microsoft. “Banks need to reduce costs on one hand and support workers in their high-value activities on the other. An efficient, connected organization is essential to meeting those goals, and that entails a shift from the siloed model that has traditionally characterized the way many banks work. Now, we’re seeing banks moving towards a more fluid, networked environment that empowers each worker to connect with the people and resources they need so they can deliver new value and connected experiences.”

As banks look to new, distributed organizational structures in a bid to control costs, the question of how to optimize the digital workplace has become a hot topic. “Some banks are moving whole groups of employees into home-based or ‘hot-desk’ working environments as a way to achieve significant real estate savings,” says Hazou. “That brings a number of challenges, not least in ensuring that every employee is integrated into the same collaborative experience as their office-based colleagues. Employee engagement is a key performance indicator for bank management, and this becomes challenging as more people move their cultural centre of gravity from the office to a home-based environment. Those people need to feel integrated, and tools like Skype for Business with video really do create that sense of belonging and communication, wherever your workplace has moved to.”

While many banks are just embarking on this journey, some are already strides ahead. Metro Bank in the UK is focused on using flexible technology to offer customers the best banking experience how, when and where they want it. The bank uses Microsoft Office 365, Yammer and Microsoft Dynamics CRM to support personalized interactions with customers so it can focus on innovative banking services, with the technical agility and operational flexibility to implement best practices across all locations.

In this new digital workplace silos are not so much a physical constraint as a state of mind. As well as connecting with each other, workers can access relevant information from across the organization through solutions like Microsoft Delve, which uses machine learning to surface information that is relevant to what the individual is working on. “Delve is about being able to tap information in a controlled way from across the organization that you may not otherwise have known about,” explains Hazou. “For example, somebody in Paris working on a solution for a client might benefit from seeing a similar document another colleague is working on in Prague. Delve will surface that information because it uses machine learning to understand the individual and what is relevant to them. It’s built on the Office Graph architecture, which sits across the organization and represents content, activity and the relationships between them across the entire Office 365 suite. That really enables banks to leverage data and organizational insights in a networked and collaborative environment across existing silos.”

Above all, each person needs to have the right tools to do their job the best they can. In order to truly empower every employee, banks are looking beyond simply providing discrete tools such as email, instant messaging and mobility. Instead, they’re working to deliver solutions specific to each employee’s needs, and this is where insight into the experience of each persona – from the relationship manager to the managing director – pays dividends.

“As banks look at how to maximize efficiency and productivity, understanding the workplace journey of their staff is the best way to identify key function high-value activities,” explains Hazou. “By looking at daily activities through the eyes of different ‘personas’, banks can understand what their high-value activities are, and how best to apply technology to making them more productive and collaborative.

“Some banks are already doing their own persona studies, and they are also able to engage Microsoft’s banking domain expertise to study their employees’ journeys through the User Experience process delivered by Microsoft Consulting Services. Whichever path they choose, a persona study is an important step in delivering a digital workplace that transforms the way their people do business. And by using familiar technologies such as the Office 365 suite to deliver solutions for each persona, they can achieve that transformation without upheaval.”

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In a digitally-connected world, bank customers expect intuitive, highly personalized engagement across all channels – and banks are rising to the challenge. “Factors such as the economic downturn and the rise of fintechs with smart technology platforms have caused customers to rethink who they should work with and how they can meet their financial needs,” says Marcelo Marquez, director of Worldwide Financial Services at Microsoft. “As a result, financial institutions face the challenge of steering their entire infrastructure – from the branch to the ATM – in a direction that enables exceptional customer service.”

It’s a challenge that banks across the world are working to address, says Edwin Van der Ouderaa, managing director, financial services at Accenture Digital. “Bank customers want the Uber experience – they want to get a loan or make payments with two taps on their smartphone, in real time, with no paper involved. It’s a logical expectation given people’s mobile-first lifestyles: I want to buy a car, not a loan; I want to finance that purchase with a few taps on my phone and then drive away. That is all possible now, and banks are looking at how they leverage technology and data to achieve it.”

Cognitive computing and machine learning technologies are enabling banks to create digital advisors that can learn from behavioral data, anticipate customers’ needs and make personalized recommendations. “Bankers want to know who they’re talking to besides their transaction,” says Steven Jacobowitz, associate partner – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Global at IBM. “Cognitive computing enables them to take information that’s stored in the bank’s electronic data warehouse and all the social sites, and to develop a customer profile. Bank staff can see the best way to interact with the customer and, based on their behavior, recommend the right products to increase their wealth and gain a greater share of their wallet.”

IBM is working with Microsoft to combine cognitive computing with machine learning in Microsoft Dynamics CRM, enabling banks to turn data into actionable insights. “We’re combining IBM’s industry expertise in financial services with Microsoft’s products to tell the whole digital banking story, enabling banks to augment their existing technology investments,” says Jacobowitz. “Using Dynamics CRM, the banker can see a 360-degree view of the customer’s household or company, including all the accounts the client holds with the bank, their interactions, their value to the bank and any customer service issues they’ve had. We’ve also included indicators to say what type of buyer the client is, based on all that information. The client’s banking profile can be compared with other similar behavioral profiles to gauge what they’re likely to want to purchase and generate recommendations for the next best action or product reference. The solution also dips into the knowledge base and brings back the appropriate resources to help agents deliver the best service to the customer. This gives bank staff a full picture of all the opportunities the bank has with the client.”

Accenture and Avanade recently launched Accenture-Avanade Customer Analytics & Insight, a banking-specific modular CRM solution that orchestrates omni-channel interactions and provides a framework that turns analytical customer insights into actionable treatments. The solution extends the capabilities of Microsoft Dynamics CRM using models running on Microsoft Azure Machine Learning and leverages Accenture’s patented Customer Analytic Record – a one-of-its-kind data model to manage and structure big data to enable customer needs/life stage/context-based micro-segmentation. “Big data analysis enables banks to predict the type of purchases the customer is going to make and the size of loan they will need,” says Van der Ouderaa. “Those insights are used to deliver a personalized experience to the customer, to do real-time price analytics and risk scoring and to provide benefits such as merchant rewards. It makes the whole bank come alive to the customer.”

In a mobile-first world, carrying those insights around is essential in enabling bank staff and financial advisors to deliver insightful customer service where it’s needed – and the security and cross-platform capabilities of Windows 10 are enabling banks to empower mobile staff. “Advisors can use simple questionnaires or high-impact images to do the financial planning for clients and explain how the bank could be a source for their growth,” says Marquez. “In many cases, using digital signatures, those advisors can close the deal while they’re on the road.”

These capabilities are already transforming the banking experience into proactive, personalized engagement with customers. “By using data and mobile technology banks can proactively reach out to the consumer with a proposal, instead of waiting for customers to come to them,” concludes Marquez. “They can design loosely coupled infrastructures that enable them to partner with different entities to provide a holistic service – for example, by providing payment and settlement for an app. In doing so, banks will become part of a bigger value chain, and part of customers’ everyday lives.

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Insurers have faced plenty of challenges in recent years, but opportunities are emerging for those who are ready to take them. “Against a backdrop of soft markets, competitive issues and low interest rates, today’s general insurers are focusing on claims to reduce their loss ratios,” says Tony Jacob, managing director of worldwide insurance at Microsoft. “They’re finding new ways to improve the claims experience for policyholders, and exploring how to improve their claims analytics capabilities to optimize processing, mitigate losses and identify fraudulent activity.”

In today’s highly competitive environment the insurer who helps a claimant quickly get back to normal stands to deliver customer satisfaction and build loyalty. “Whether it’s flexibility to initiate and track a claim through a customer’s preferred communication channel or improving operational efficiencies, insurers need to be able to engage, process and resolve claims quickly and accurately,” says Patti Griffin, global product lead at Accenture Duck Creek. “Key to achieving this is to automate what can be automated, and streamline what cannot be automated to make it more efficient.”

Rising to these challenges can make a big difference to the bottom line, even without increasing the number of customers. “A combination of risk and fraud prevention in the underwriting process with real-time fraud detection and analytics in claims can improve the combined ratio up to 5%,” says Christian van Leeuwen, CTO at Microsoft Gold partner FRISS.

“On average, claims expenses are 60-80% of any carrier’s overall expenses,” says Ben Moreland, VP data and analytics at Innovation Group. “Even a 1% decrease in claims expenses can be greater than a 5% improvement in another area.”

Microsoft and its partners are enabling insurers to deliver differentiating service to customers while generating the insights essential for proactive business. Examples include Insuresoft’s Diamond Claims, which is available as a stand-alone solution or as part of its policy processing suite and complemented by its Diamond Mobile application. The system is fully integrated with SQL Server Reporting Services and can be deployed through the Microsoft Azure cloud, enabling it to scale and adapt to the changing needs of clients. “We provide a powerful rules engine that enables our customers to create work plans for their claims staff and measure key performance indicators in real time,” says Linde Wolff, product manager at Insuresoft. “This is a game-changer for our customers because it enables them not only to identify areas where they need to improve, but also to update their rules to instantly drive that change.”

As more insurers connect siloed data to achieve operational efficiency, powerful analytics capabilities, combined with the scalability of the cloud, are enabling them to turn that data into insights. “By replicating the claims data from the claims system to SQL Server, customers can gain greater access to that data, and analyse and visualize it more effectively using self-serve BI technologies such as PowerView and Power BI,” explains Jacob.

Duck Creek Claims provides automation and streamlining for claims processing as well as reporting capabilities built using Microsoft’s SQL Server Reporting Services, Integration Services, Analysis Services and SharePoint, which can be used in conjunction with Microsoft Power Pivot and Power BI. The solution enables an optimized work management experience for claims staff. Instant messaging, a discussion-thread view of file notes and the ability to email from within the claim file enable collaboration for claims adjusters, while insurers can use codeless configuration to introduce their own processes and quickly adapt to changing market demands. In addition to on-premise deployment, the suite is also supported through the Microsoft Azure cloud, enabling stunningly fast implementations: Pacific Specialty Insurance Company completed the first phase of its deployment in less than seven months, and Berkshire Hathaway deployed in two months. “Our customers are able to condense the implementation timeline so they can quickly start using the software in the market,” says Griffin.

“For a carrier, it is vital to be able not only to settle claims quickly, but also to quickly identify claims leakages or fraud and react in the best manner,” says Moreland. “This requires an analytics solution that puts trusted, current analyses at the fingertips of business users who are empowered to explore their data for greater insights, and share with colleagues who can also fully trust the data and recommendations. Through collaboration between Innovation Group and Microsoft, Insurer Analytics is able to scale to meet the ever-growing data volume demands and performance expectations of carriers, as well as help carriers position themselves for the increasingly competitive insurance landscape.”

FRISS is 100% focused on the insurance industry, with more implementations of anti-fraud solutions than any other vendor in Europe. The company is dedicated to improving indicators and models, predictive modelling, text mining, image screening, social network analysis and social media, enabling insurers to stay protected from new fraud schemes. Jeroen Morrenhof, CEO of FRISS, notes a clear rise in the use of analytics by insurers wanting to prevent fraud. “This is necessitated by combined ratios and losses under serious pressure, and the need for continuous improvement in claims processes,” he says. “In order to find not only the fraudsters of today, but also those of tomorrow, insurers need to continuously improve their detection engine, indicators and predictive models to make sure they identify new patterns as they emerge.”

Worldwide studies have found that 5-10% of claims are likely fraudulent, leading forward-looking insurers to take a proactive approach to addressing the issue. For example, Folksam, one of the largest insurers in Sweden, expects to deliver 15-20% more suspicious claim cases for investigation after implementing the FRISS solution for Fraud Detection at Claims including FRISS Analytics. “The solution enables Folksam to improve its loss ratio by increasing the chances of detecting fraud, and to minimize false positives” says Morrenhof. “These results have been proven through our track record with all FRISS customers in 12 countries.”

Looking ahead, increasingly advanced analytics capabilities will be required as the volume and types of data available for analysis continue to grow. Towers Watson is working with leading insurers to help them improve their claims performance and gain competitive advantage. “Our claims specialists are helping to identify areas in which insurers can optimize their performance on claims costs,” says Tom Helm, head of claims consulting, risk consulting and software at Towers Watson. “We are deploying our analytics, software and claims capabilities together to help our clients fully understand their current state with regard to claims analytics and supporting them in determining the key questions their future analytics capability needs to answer. We are working with them to set out the data, tools, skills and outputs required to achieve these goals as well as helping them with the delivery.”

Microsoft and its partners are poised to deliver the capabilities insurers need to ensure fast, cost effective claims handling and analytics. “We’re now entering a new area of advanced analytics with our insurance customers as we integrate the Revolution R analytics solution with SQL Server 2016 and Azure Machine Learning,” concludes Jacob. “As well as enabling insurance companies to better mine and analyse their claims data, this delivers the capability to consume huge amounts of data to simulate and model catastrophes such as cyclones, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes and terrorist activities. Giving insurance carriers a single capability that could improve both loss ratios today and catastrophe modelling for tomorrow is very powerful.

The post Getting a handle on claims appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

By securely making their proprietary software available to third parties, banks can bring to market new, innovative apps and give rise to more choice and services for banking customers. All of this is being made possible by application programming interfaces (APIs) – software gateways that let different applications work together and communicate with each other, such that outside developers can create new apps that take advantage of certain banking functions without going behind their firewalls or accessing personally identifiable information.

Although APIs haven’t exactly taken off in the banking world just yet, Guillermo Kopp, LATAM financial services industry director at Microsoft, believes they will soon. “In the next five years, APIs will add trillions of dollars to the economy,” he says. “In other industries, companies have moved quickly to launch APIs and give developers access to their source code. PayPal’s payment API, for example, lets third parties design and host their own checkout pages. And while we expect the shift for financial services institutions to the API economy to be amore gradual one, it’s something we will certainly see more of in the near future.”

For many banks, APIs serve as an easy pathway to drive innovation through partnerships rather than having to build everything from scratch themselves. “The opening of APIs extends banks’ client value chains by tapping external pools of expertise which are not available and not practical to fund internally,” explains Peter Hazou, director of business development, Financial Services at Microsoft. “The transformation in bank operating models means it is no longer an efficient use of resources to construct all elements of their desired end-state of digital business themselves. APIs are a natural modus operandi for extending reach and relevance.”

Indeed, as some leading banks are already finding out, APIs are an ideal option for keeping pace with client digital expectations that they cannot support alone.

“They permit banks to focus on and develop their core strengths rather than trying to be all things to all people across all technologies as current trends demand,” says Hazou. “They also broaden the network effect of their services by connecting to external providers in the wider economy.”

Ultimately, Hazou expects the flexibility that comes with use of APIs will become too good an opportunity to turn down. “From a business model point of view, other service industries are experiencing quantum growth by opening their interfaces through APIs,” he says. “Banks can now do the same.”

The post The shift towards the API economy appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

First published in the winter edition of OnWindows magazine

Thousands of delegates headed to Barcelona in November to discover the latest ideas and innovations at the Smart City Expo World Congress 2015. Microsoft’s CityNext initiative was a major draw, showcasing solutions from 42 partners that are empowering governments, businesses and citizens to create more sustainable, prosperous and economically competitive cities. A number of key themes emerged during the three-day event, reflecting hot topics for cities around the world and the wealth of solutions available to address them.

[inlinequote]“There is a growing movement to use phone data, CCTV and sensors to help create a real-time digital experience of a city” [/inlinequote]

Digitising the city was a common theme in many conversations. “There is a growing movement to use phone data, CCTV and sensors to help create a real-time digital experience of a city,” says Paul Hart, director of government marketing at Microsoft. “If you can digitize the analogue, you can digitize the city, and now we’re seeing the application of the internet of things (IoT), smart apps and the amazing ability of the cloud to store, manipulate and analyse the massive volumes of data. For example, there are mobile apps that enable citizens and their phones to act as the sensor and digitizer, taking a photo of an issue such as pot-holes or graffiti and sending data to the relevant authority to fix the problem. Now, we are seeing innovations that can detect issues without having to rely on humans. Cameras and sensors constantly detect and monitor things such as vehicle and crowd movements, air quality, building energy usage and the availability of parking places. And with machine learning analyzing the data stream to spot patterns, anomalies and predict outcomes, the city gets smarter.”

Smart use of automatically captured data, and the appropriate privacy treatment of this data, can enable more inclusive interaction between the city and its citizens, says Hart. “Smart technology helps attract a vibrant population to the city either to live and work or just to visit, but cities also need to make sure everybody – not just social media savvy users, or those who can afford technology – is included. Innovations need to benefit all sectors of a city society, enabled by the software, analytics and cloud technologies that make it all viable. That can help those with different needs, such as older generations, to interact and benefit.”

[inlinequote]“Innovations need to benefit all sectors of a city society, enabled by the software, analytics and cloud technologies that make it all viable”[/inlinequote]

Tourism was also a hot topic at the event, as cities look for ways not only to attract visitors, but also to inspire them to spend money. “Many cities have a dependency on tourism to drive their economy,” explains Hart. “If your city’s residents visit other places during vacations and spend their money elsewhere, it’s imperative to balance that by attracting high spending visitors to your city. We had a lot of demonstrations of proximity-based apps that respond when you arrive in the city and tell you where to get a coffee, taxi, bus or where to stay, as well as apps that help to guide crowds around the city and its attractions.

“For example, delegates were able to see how CityNext Partner Bismart has worked with Microsoft, Barcelona City Council and the Sagrada Família to transform the visitor experience by enabling the analysis of massive amounts of real-time data from the city’s IoT sensors. Insights from that data enable the Smart Destination app to help tourists and city residents plan their Barcelona itinerary based on their interests, budget and available time.”

With so much emphasis on the movement of large numbers of people, transportation was another major highlight. “There was a lot of focus on enabling green transportation, from bicycles to trains and, of course, cars,” says Hart. “The challenge of cars sparked discussions around traffic management and parking. We saw a lot of activity around using sensors to address these issues and visitors were able to explore Altran’s IoT-enabled car at the Microsoft booth.”

Security is a top concern for cities, and public safety was high on the agenda. “Security of the population and visitors is a vital ingredient for a good economy,” says Hart. “We saw a lot of solutions for public safety, including the ‘first responder’ exhibit at the Microsoft booth, where our partners demonstrated how technology trends such as cloud computing, body-worn cameras, CCTV, digital evidence management, analytics and public safety broadband are revolutionizing solutions in this space.” The strength of Microsoft CityNext was amply illustrated at the 2015 World Smart City Awards, which numbered several Microsoft partners among the finalists. The Innovative Idea Award was presented to Findeter for its Digital Diamond project in partnership with Microsoft Citynext partner Fundación Metrópoli and Microsoft. The project combines urban intelligence with digital technology to enable competitiveness and eco-development in Colombia.

Across the event, there was clear evidence of the innovation and expertise that is making the smart city vision a reality. “The smart city is a subject that generates a lot of imaginative future thinking, technology innovation and aspirations for positive societal impact, equality and sustainability,” concludes Hart. “But it’s clear from this year’s Smart City Expo World Congress that we are now moving beyond the hope and aspiration and into execution and delivery mode.”

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Manufacturers are embracing the internet of things to enable exceptional levels of intelligence, performance and connectivity

As the internet of things (IoT) continues to gather momentum, manufacturers are increasingly aware of its power to enable intelligent, connected, service-centric businesses. IDC’s 2015 Global IoT Decision Maker Survey found that 66% of manufacturers now view the IoT as a strategic initiative, and this is borne out by the growing number of businesses that are implementing IoT solutions to turn data from connected devices into actionable insights that support fast, accurate decisions.

Microsoft’s commitment to the IoT can be seen in the growing number of new services, from real-time data processing to machine learning, that it has made available through Azure over recent months. The results can be seen in projects such as the connected factory created by KUKA Systems Group, where robots sense their surroundings and work alongside human staff; or Lido Stone Works, which has cut maintenance costs by connecting its factory-floor machines with the experts who made them, resulting in a 30% increase in productivity. Most recently, Microsoft’s Azure IoT Suite and Cortana Analytics Suite have generated excitement across the industry, with several implementations illustrating the potential they hold for manufacturers.

Azure IoT enables secure and simple IoT connectivity by providing a hub for organizations to connect devices securely to the cloud. Its potential to enable truly service-centric business is illustrated by Rockwell Automation, which is already using Azure IoT to extend its monitoring systems for valuable capital assets across the oil and gas supply chain. “The equipment our customers use for extracting, moving, refining and selling fuel is the heart of the supply chain,” says Gary Pearsons, VP and GM for the services business at Rockwell Automation. “Built on Microsoft Azure IoT services, our solutions enable unprecedented efficiency by bringing the data generated by even the most remote assets into the cloud, driving business insights and evolving an entire industry.”

Rockwell Automation’s Azure IoT powered solutions enable the remote monitoring of assets, with the ability to use the collected data for predictive and preventative maintenance. “Data visibility across the entire supply chain enables insights that help our customers to orchestrate everything from deliveries to equipment maintenance, ultimately creating a better fuelling experience for drivers,” says Pearsons.

Over on the desert test sites of North America, Cortana Analytics Suite is helping to accelerate the North American Eagle (NAE) team’s progress towards breaking the current land-speed world record of 763 miles per hour. The NAE team has deployed Cortana Analytics Suite on board its rebuilt F-104 Lockheed ‘Starfighter’, where its advanced analytics capabilities – including machine learning, big data storage and processing, and perceptual intelligence – are enabling them to turn data from into intelligent action.

Safety is of paramount importance, and the speed of the jet-powered car has to be increased incrementally as the team works towards the record. With every increase, the team needs to strike a balance between keeping the car from taking flight and preventing it from sinking into the desert – and to do that, it needs to analyze huge volumes of data to generate the insights that inform crucial adjustments to the car between test runs. In the past, that process had entailed weeks of waiting as hard drives filled with sensor data were sent to a regional supercomputer for analysis and results returned. But with Cortana Analytics Suite, the team gets the insight it needs in hours, instead of weeks.

Enabled by the Microsoft cloud, more than 30 sensors gather almost 12 million points of data and the team is processing over 2,000 measurements to obtain rapid results – giving them the insights they need in hours, instead of weeks. “With the results comes the confidence to go faster,” says Darren Grove, NAE computational fluid dynamics engineer. “When the data from the on-board sensors matches what the model says should be happening, we know we’re safe to push a little harder.”

The scope and capabilities of these implementations point to the power of the IoT to enable proactive, service-centric business models for manufacturers. From the factory floor, across the supply chain to the heart of a jet-powered car, the IoT is enabling organizations to make optimal use of their key strategic asset – the data that flows between people, systems and things.

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More than 8,000 delegates headed to Singapore on 12-15 October to discuss key issues and solutions in banking and capital markets at Sibos 2015 – making it the second-largest Sibos event to date.

Microsoft’s commitment to banking and capital markets created a huge buzz among delegates who were keen to engage with the company and find out how its solutions are helping the world’s leading financial institutions to drive digital transformation, gain break-through risk insight, and protect their business through cybersecurity. Rupesh Khendry, director of capital markets industry solutions, and Peter Hazou, director of banking industry solutions at Microsoft, gave us their key takeaways from the event.

Banks are digitally transforming

“Banks are clearly looking to digitally transform,” says Khendry. “We’ve been discussing the Digital Bank for a while, and banks across the world are now acting on that. At Sibos we had some great discussions about how embracing an open and connected systems approach to drive innovation can enable banks to deliver a great customer experience, with platforms like machine learning and analytics helping them to gain better insight and a deeper understanding of their customers.”

Banks are heading to the cloud

“Banks have shed their initial apprehension about the cloud, and they’re embracing it as a way to transform their business and help them be more agile,” says Hazou. “We saw huge interest from customers and analysts in our briefing on ‘The Trusted Cloud in Banking Transformation’. Microsoft has worked closely with the financial industry to deliver the trusted cloud and this has generated momentum, with banks across the world now implementing cloud projects.” “Of course no conversation about banking is complete without some discussion of regulatory compliance,” says Hazou. “At Sibos, we provided details about the Financial Services Compliance Program which allows financial industry stakeholders to deeply examine our cloud systems, services and processes, to help banks achieve growth while focusing on their core responsibilities to remain compliant.”

Risk and regulatory requirements

The cloud is enabling banks to leverage machine learning for many of their risk and analytics requirements. “Banks are asking how they can better integrate data and insights from the front, middle and back office,” says Khendry. “Risk and regulatory are the overarching concerns, and banks were interested in going beyond regular transaction processing systems to understand the risk in the business. We showcased how the Microsoft Data Analytics platform, including Azure IoT Suite, Cortana Analytics Suite and Azure Data Lake, can help banks to mitigate risk and deliver insightful customer service.”

Putting customers at the centre

“Customer engagement is a topic we hear a lot about,” says Khendry. “Delegates were keen to find out how technologies like Microsoft Dynamics CRM, as well as cloud-enabled data processing capabilities, can help them optimize the customer experience. Banks have a wealth of customer data, but it’s often trapped in data silos. Now, they’re beginning to use the evolving data processing and machine learning capabilities of the cloud to anticipate customer needs and customize products and services to fit them.”

Productivity is top of mind

“We had a lot of discussions with banks about productivity,” says Hazou. “This area had taken a bit of a back seat recently as banks focused on addressing key industry issues like regulatory compliance, but now productivity has come into sharper focus. A lot of banks that came to see us were very interested in Microsoft Office 365 and how it can help them empower staff to be more productive. They saw how Windows 10 takes the seamless, digital banking experience a step further through the power of universal apps that work on phones, tablets and PCs, offering Windows 10 touch functionality and Office 365 integration while reducing workplace and development sprawl. We had some very detailed discussions about how our solutions apply to the two main lines of business that were present at Sibos: treasury and security services.”

Mobility matters

Most people now expect mobile connectivity, and Microsoft showcased how its latest devices and software can enable anytime, anywhere productivity. Delegates were keen to explore how Microsoft’s new Surface Book and Surface Pro 4, with the Windows 10 operating system and Office 365 productivity tools, can empower staff to deliver the service customers want. “There was a lot of excitement about our new devices and how they can help bankers be more mobile,” says Khendry.

Cybersecurity is a key concern

With new cyber-threats emerging all the time, cybersecurity is a perennial concern for financial services firms. Delegates at Sibos were able to see for themselves how Microsoft’s Digital Crimes Unit is committed to identifying and disrupting cybercrime through public/private partnerships with a specific focus on financial services. “Security is a key concern for our customers and they were keen to understand our commitment to protecting them through the trusted cloud and our cybersecurity leadership,” says Hazou.

“We focused on the issues our customers are facing and how we can help them to transform to digital businesses,” concludes Khendry. “We discussed the issues that matter to banks and we got some great feedback from customers who felt that we were speaking their language.”

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“For many years, the branch was our main banking channel – the bank would open the doors and wait for the customers to walk in,” says Marcelo Marquez, director of business development, worldwide banking industry at Microsoft. “We moved into digital channels with a similar state of mind – to provide an infrastructure for customers to take the initiative and serve themselves. But omni-channel is different. Any technology that the customer has access to could become a channel – not only the phone, but wearable devices and the internet of things. Instead of waiting for the customer to serve themselves, omni-channel is about reaching out and engaging with the customer in different ways.”

Marquez says that in order to achieve success in the omni-channel era, banks need to be:

• Insightful – using real-time analytics to translate customer information into knowledge and actions that enable different conversations
• Always connected – using mobile devices as a window for the bank’s compute power, on premise and in the cloud
• Always available – a click away from customers, always ready to have a conversation
• Attentive to customers and able to anticipate their needs.

“All these qualities demand digital reach, and real-time analytics will be key to creating the smart omni-channel layer that can enable this,” explains Marquez. “Instead of having a web or digital mobile experience where customers take the initiative for every action, banks will have to create a digital advisor that is proactive, reaching out to the customer.”

Through his discussions with customers, Marquez has found that the bank’s omni-channel strategy must address some key issues. “First, banks need to modify their own culture around becoming digital. This transformation starts from the inside out and requires a balance of providing access to the latest technology to customers and ensuring simplified processes for employees. Banks will always have early adopters, but to make them mainstream it will require a platform for customers to learn and share experiences. As we move forward, new and different service models will be tested and, in many cases, banks will provide the training and resources for consumers to adopt these.”

Rising to those challenges can also open up a wealth of opportunities. “Banks will be able to use the technology in different ways and uncover new types of opportunities,” says Marquez. “For example, in terms of being insightful, machine learning will redefine how banks interact with customers. It will enable us to create smarter applications that will leverage information and customer behavior insights to create a segment of one experience with customers. While building a better, more relevant interaction with the consumer, the bank might also find an opportunity to generate new ways of marketing, for itself and for partners it works with, to create a one-stop shop for financial needs.”

With so many possibilities ahead, there is no magic formula for omni-channel service delivery, and Microsoft is working with its partners to demonstrate what they can achieve. “We’ve been working with our partners to share with customers the state of the possible; to show them the disruptive technologies of the future and how we foresee these could make a big difference in the way we bank,” says Marquez. “We build demonstrations of how some of these things can be achieved with Microsoft technology and the knowledge of our partners. For example, technology designs with Infusion Development or our Smart Banking initiative with Accenture and Avanade shows what is possible in this omni-channel world, where technology is redefining how the bank interacts proactively with its customers.”

One thing is certain: driven by consumer demand, omni-channel is set to transform banking service delivery, and banks need to consider how they will achieve it. “We all agree on the objective of omni-channel, but the most important thing is that it is a journey,” concludes Marquez. “We have been doing banking the same way for many years, but now the consumer is driving change and demanding new service models. Banks need to have a strategy in place to deliver those models as new technologies emerge.”

Originally published in OnWindows

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