By Werner Joubert, Commercial SYS Business Director (South Africa & SADC) at ASUS
When it comes to IT and digital resources, small businesses in South Africa need to extract every bit of value they can from them. Indeed, small businesses make up a very valuable part of the nation’s economy. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) employ nearly two-thirds of South Africa’s labour force, and their total economic output accounts for more than a third of our GDP. However, infrastructure challenges, restricted access to markets and a lack of appropriate technology and business resources continue to hamper a lot of businesses, especially in the face of accelerated digital transformation and the growing importance and impact of the digital economy.
In light of promising developments such as the launch of a new R100 billion transformation fund to support black-owned enterprises, and prompts by government departments for businesses to engage with support and incentive programmes, South Africa’s small businesses need to align their business strategy with their digital one. This includes considering what digital (and AI-ready) hardware and solutions they need today to build the successful enterprises of tomorrow.
Business tech needs to work in the present and future
It’s safe to say now that no modern enterprise is complete without some level of digital infrastructure, even if it’s a lone entrepreneur sitting at a coffee shop or a team of people working out of a home. At the same time, any digitisation strategy or attempt to use technology for business purposes comes with inherent challenges. Do you have the prerequisite IT staff or skills available to make full use of solutions? How difficult is it to integrate new systems? What about data privacy and security? What solutions are the best fit for your organisation?
Small business leaders confront these challenges by first establishing what they want their business technology to achieve, or the role they want it to fulfil. From there, leaders can map their digital journey and identify the digital platforms, tools and resources they need, if and how they can use them, and how they use them to unlock growth, new enterprise opportunities and efficiencies.
Technology should also play an active role in helping to sustain a business by providing value throughout its entire lifecycle. Small businesses face a concerning survival rate, with more than 50% of them not making it past their fifth year of operation. Looming challenges, such as a potential VAT increase, could also influence the criticality of initial technology investments. To sum it up, small businesses need technology that is robust and reliable, receives long-term support from manufacturers, and, most importantly, features capabilities that accommodate business growth and the solutions that will propel that growth.
Ready for AI?
AI is no longer a technology reserved for giant corporates and multinationals, or for those with unlimited IT budgets at their disposal. It is also a business imperative as a means to improve business productivity and performance. By adopting AI-driven tools, enterprises can optimise operations and reduce costs by automating manual, repetitive tasks. One such example is generative AI tools that companies can use to create marketing content and assets, and chatbots that can interact with customers and deliver consistent sales and support channel experience.
AI also represents a new frontier in customer insight. Data analytics can enable teams and leaders to learn more about their customers, their behaviours as customers and the overall market, leading them to tailor and enhance their product and service offerings for maximum results. In doing so, they become more competitive and stand out as a company that goes the extra mile in delivering quality solutions and a unique experience to their customers. At the same time, many businesses that are adopting AI are using it as a tool for innovation, resulting in it positively impacting business profit margins.
The demand for AI-driven tools and products has led to an all-new generation of PC hardware and devices specifically designed and optimised for deploying and managing them. Desktops and laptops now come equipped with built-in AI functionalities and processing capabilities to run and manage AI workloads, all while delivering the established levels of portability, security and ergonomic design.
Preparing for the next stage of business
The ability to leverage digital technologies is what will make or break many of South Africa’s small businesses. Success will depend on a confluence of factors ranging from business environments, availability of skills and labour, access to infrastructure and the implementation of ideas using trusted and reliable solutions.
Critical to all of that are the platforms, systems and PC resources they will use to get their businesses off the ground and support long-term, sustainable growth. Combined with a drive to innovate and an eye towards the future and the technologies that will lead us to it, leaders can exercise their computational muscles and realise their vision for a modern, connected and intelligent enterprise.
