The power of data in motion

Many organisations today are sitting on an untapped goldmine – their data. For years, companies have been struggling to cash in on the enormous opportunities that data brings as they lack the proper understanding, capabilities and tools to harness its value.

The proliferation of data is a by-product of the advancement of Industry 4.0 and the growth of emerging technologies. In fact, a study by global research and analyst firm IDC revealed that by 2025 worldwide data will grow to 175 zettabytes.

Data is a very powerful tool that all organisations in the digital age have access to. It can deliver a plethora of strategic business value from improving productivity, streamlining operations, enhancing customer experiences to driving innovation and more. Businesses are increasingly under pressure to not only attract customers but also to gain deeper insights into their customers’ needs to be able to develop longstanding relationships and stay ahead of the curve. Therefore, becoming ‘data-driven’ has been a common objective for organisations especially in the retail sector.

Data flows into the organisation from various sources at all times, making it challenging to harness its true potential. Typically, conventional approaches apply analytics after data is stored, which often provide insights too late. Today, businesses seek to capture data streams in real-time and wield that information to develop an edge over those who do not. This has given rise to the demand for tools that are capable of instantaneously streaming huge volumes of data to quickly deliver personalised customer experiences.

Among the key players addressing this growing industry demand is data in motion software provider Confluent. The Confluent cloud-native platform is designed to help organisations unlock the value of real-time data. By leveraging a data-in-motion platform based on Apache Kafka, Confluent empowers businesses to easily access data as real-time streams, unlock legacy data and integrate data silos. This then allows organisations to seamlessly develop applications that will address their customers’ evolving needs.

“We are seeing huge demands from businesses across different verticals for solutions that will enable them to use data to better serve customers and be more competitive in the market,” said Ala Al Sharif, Senior Solutions Architect, Confluent. “Many organisations, especially in sectors such as telecommunications, finance and retail are refocusing their investments into solutions that will allow them to leverage data that’s constantly moving. This is primarily driven by the need to address customers’ demands for faster transactions and services.”

According to Al Sharif, a good example of this is the evolving shopping behaviour of consumers. The rise of e-commerce and the prevalence of multichannel customer engagement frameworks have transformed the rapport between retailers and consumers. Consumers expect access to up-to-date inventory and products information as well as easy engagement and hyper-personalised experiences from brands across multiple touchpoints as they move toward a purchasing decision.

“Furthermore, customers who would traditionally go the stores to purchase products are now expecting similar, if not better, experiences from a brand’s online site. They want to be able to see the items available at the store using their digital devices and expect the goods to be delivered by the following day or even within the same day. In addition, they want to be able to track the whole shipment process in real-time,” he explained.

However, many brands have built their digital capabilities separate from their brick-and-mortar stores. Because of this, they tend to miss out on the opportunity to deliver seamless and hyper-personalised experiences to customers.

By linking various applications that are vital in enabling customers’ entire buying journey, the Confluent platform enables businesses to provide customers with the most up-to-date information, regardless of the channel they choose to use.

“The platform allows organisations to consolidate data from various disjoined systems to get a complete unified view of their customers’ buying patterns. In doing so, they can deliver customer 360 and omnichannel experiences,” said Al Sharif.

Navigating the cloud era

As businesses continue to accelerate their digitalisation strategies, the shift to the cloud is a natural part of their evolution. However, a common misconception is an assumption that all existing applications and data can be shifted to the cloud in one go.

“Often, applications are tied to existing data systems in complex ways and some are built to run on specific systems that can’t be moved to the cloud,” Al Sharif explained. “This presents a significant challenge because moving data back and forth between on-prem and cloud environments can be cumbersome.”

Addressing this challenge requires the co-existence of on-premise and cloud infrastructures or a hybrid cloud setup. “With the Confluent platform, we leverage what we call a ‘smart data pipeline’, which streamlines the flow of data from on-prem environments and replicates them to different cloud environments. This allows organisations to build a future-proof, scalable platform that can support their data streaming needs,” said Al Sharif.

With everything related to data, security is a number one concern. When in motion, data is susceptible to a variety of risks including human error, network failures, insecure file sharing, malicious actions and more. For organisations seeking to leverage tools that will enable them to take advantage of data in motion, they need to invest in a solution that doesn’t compromise on data protection.

“The Confluent platform is secure by default. It reduces the risk of security breaches without hindering agile development,” said Al Sharif. “As a cloud-native solution, it allows customers to deploy the platform in their private cloud and take advantage of its self-managed controls. They can also use it as-a-service via public clouds such as AWS, Azure or Google Cloud, and rest assured that it is secure and compliant with various data protection regulations.”

By working closely with its partners in the region, Confluent seeks to support enterprises to harness the unparalleled value that data brings. “We also offer free online training for our customers as well as a wide range of certifications that will help them broaden their knowledge on data in motion.”

In an increasingly evolving landscape, businesses need to harness the data that constantly flows throughout their organisations in real-time. This will empower them to keep up and meet heightened consumer demands, create meaningful customer experiences and thrive in an increasingly competitive landscape.