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FINAL WORD
‘It’s time to
look over the
horizon at your
digital future’
Simon Carpenter, Chief Technology
Advisor at SAP Africa, says the Fourth
Industrial Revolution has the potential
to widen the digital divide and is
particularly critical to Africa if it is to fully
participate in the global economy.
I
t’s unplanned, unstoppable and inescapable. That sounds like a
tsunami, right? Not quite. It’s the Fourth Industrial Revolution;
a wave of exponential and converging technological progress
that is washing over every facet of our world. It is demolishing
our received wisdoms about how the world works and should be
structured. It is leaving the less agile to be tossed aside as disrupted
detritus while the bold, the prescient and the innovative create and
capture new opportunities.
The Digital Revolution paradigm shift
In fact, simply calling this the Fourth Industrial Revolution is to do
ourselves a disservice because it lures us into thinking that this is
simply a faster, cheaper, smarter version of the three waves of the
Industrial Revolution that have brought humanity thus far. It tempts
us to think that we must just buy the next shiny piece of technology,
incorporate it into our legacy organisation and processes and it’s
‘business as usual’. That progress is linear. It’s not, it’s a step change.
It is better to call this the Digital Revolution. It is a radical inflection
point that gives humanity an opportunity to correct many of the
imbalances, injustices and inequities that have arisen because of the
Industrial Revolution. And, for us in Africa, it presents an opportunity
to build globally competitive economies and far more inclusive,
equitable societies.
However, to achieve the full potential of this Digital Revolution
requires new and different thinking; a new mental architecture
willing to takes risks and to experiment one’s way into the future.
We must be cognisant of the fact that the pace of change is too fast
and dynamic to get into paralysis by analysis and lengthy, tortuous
planning cycles. New levels of collaboration and partnering between
global stakeholders that we haven’t seen or experienced before
will accelerate progress. New skills and competencies, that we may
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