Cisco : Business Today Enterprise Roundup

By Yuri Wahab, Managing Director for Malaysia, Cisco

The Malaysian enterprise ICT sector has remained resilient over the years with ICT spending on track to reach US$5.2 billion in 2012, a 7 per cent growth from 2011 . That said, given the global economic uncertainty, businesses may continue to adopt a conservative approach to ICT spending, with more emphasis on optimising IT budgets. They aim to invest in new technologies and enhancements that will reduce medium to long term costs and improve business agility, operational efficiencies and productivity.

At Cisco, we believe that ICT sector in Malaysia will continue to improve in the upcoming year, in light of the strengthening economy and domestic consumption in the country. This is especially complemented by an increase in ICT contribution to GDP, on the back of various governmental efforts and initiatives such as the Communications and Content Infrastructure focus of the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) and the recently launched Digital Malaysia.

The rapidly-increasing dependence of Gen Y on their smartphones has been at the forefront of a global mobile movement. 90 per cent of Gen Y surveyed worldwide said they check their smartphones for updates in email, texts and social media sites, often before they get out of bed, according to the 2012 Cisco Connected World Technology Report. 9 of 10 respondents globally will get dressed, brush their teeth, and want to check their smartphones as part of the morning ritual for getting ready for school or work.  The result of this recent development is a greater proliferation of mobile devices at the workplace (BYOD).  It was reported that the adoption of smartphones in Malaysia is expected to increase from 47 per cent this year to 73 per cent by the first quarter of 2013, whereas tablet adoption is expected to grow from 14 per cent to 48 per cent in the same period. What this means for employers is that the workforce of the future is more agile, more informed and more responsive than any previous generation—they live to connect and communicate.

These developments have resulted in the need for telecommunications companies, service providers and businesses to diversify their service offerings and solutions to support trends like BYOD and enable a more mobile workforce to thrive in this rapidly changing business landscape. Organisations need to incorporate a comprehensive approach to effectively design, manage, and control the access of personal devices to the corporate network with the aim of enhancing user experiences and productivity.

Moving forward, this will lead to the greater need for businesses to balance innovation aspirations with business realities. At the core of this development is the enterprise network, as businesses need to provide for a dynamic and robust network infrastructure to support new devices, platforms and equipments while ensuring that security is still of paramount importance. Some key trends that will dominate 2013 include Cloud-as-a-Service (CaaS), Software-Defined Network (SDN) and Long Term Evolution Network (LTE).

Malaysia is of strategic importance for Cisco’s business in Asia Pacific. Our business thrusts on Malaysia’s dynamic and growing connectivity. Networking, data centre virtualisation, collaboration and video will continue to be the core technologies that transform businesses and fuel the country’s economic growth.