Hot Topics: The CIO Edition 2016 by Hot Topics

THE TEAM

LEADER

Philip Randerson Founder Tom Lytton-Dickie Editor Deanna Watkins Art Director Amedeo D’Amore Product & Marketing Manager Peter Stojanovic Staff Writer Jack Hershman Staff Writer

General Enquiries contact@hottopics.ht Address: WeWork 18-21 Corsham Street, London N1 6DR

Jim Fowler, CIO of General Electric said, in his contributed article for this magazine, that, “the future belongs to companies that can craft strategies and build their capabilities to succeed in a new phase of global competition.” That new phase of global competition is inextricably linked to the pace of digital change that is driving innovation and causing disruption in equal measure. Whilst the responsibility for digital transformation has now been spread across C-level, along with tech budgets being allocated across a number of functions, the CIO clearly still has a fundamental role to play within any major IT overhaul. Following the release of our CIO 100, this edition of Hot Topics brings together 12 of the most influential CIOs globally to discuss the role itself, the key challenges within it and has a particular focus on the theme of digital identity as part of any wider digital transformation. This collection of interviews and contributed articles highlights the importance being placed on the issue of digital identity within enterprises the world over. As Frederic Gimenez, CIO of energy giant Total explains, “it is now down to identity management to help contain pressing security threats that emerge from data, but also to leverage the opportunities it presents too.” Gilberto Ceresa, CIO of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, suggests that, “the future of the automotive industry will be increasingly linked to the successful integration of digital identity-management in vehicles.” The concept of digital identity providing opportunity for business growth is supported by this edition’s cover star, Albert Hitchcock, CIO of leading education provider, Pearson. He states that, “we see huge potential in what a single learner identity can help us learn about the process of learning itself.” Whether the issue is security, customer data or personalization, the underlying theme is that having a clear strategy around digital identity is fundamental to the future of any successful enterprise.

Tom Lytton-Dickie Editor

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IN THIS ISSUE CONTENTS

12 24

VC50 Q1 2016 The Global Top 50 Tech VC Deals: Q1, 2016

THE ECONOMICS BEHIND DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION Written by the CIO of Telefonica, Phil Jordan

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12 IN IDENTITY WE TRUST Interview with the CEO of ForgeRock, Mike Ellis 16 THE MAN LEADING GE’S BIGGEST EVER REINVENTION Written by the CIO of General Electric, Jim Fowler 21 DRIVING DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION WORLDWIDE Interview with the MD & Global Digital Identity Lead of Accenture, Rex Thexton

24 LEARNING ABOUT THE PROCESS OF LEARNING Interview with the CTO of Pearson, Albert Hitchcock 29 THE CIO 100 Hot Topics’ list of the most influential CIOs globally 34 WHY YOUR DIGITAL FUTURE MAY ALREADY BE DETERMINED Interview with the CIO of Palo Alto, Jonathan Reichental 38 MANAGING THE IDENTITY OF EMPLOYEES AND CUSTOMERS ALIKE Interview with the CIO of Total, Frédéric Gimenez

CONTENTS

42 PUTTING DIGITAL IN THE DRIVING SEAT Interview with the CIO of the FCA Group, Gilberto Ceresa 46 MOVING WITH THE TIMES Written by the CIO of the FT, Christina Scott 50 EXITS Q1 2016 The Top 40 exits across global tech in the first quarter of 2016 52 “BY 2020, NO-ONE SHOULD BE HARMED OR KILLED IN A VOLVO” Interview with the CIO of Volvo, Klas Bendrik

56 THE THREE PILLARS BEHIND A CONNECTED COMPANY Interview with the CIO of Reckitt Benckiser, Darrell Stein 60 SECURITY ON AN INDUSTRIAL SCALE Interview with the CIO of Caterpillar, Julie Lagacy 64 AUTONOMOUS VEHICLES’ LONG ROAD TOWARDS CONSUMER TRUST Interview with the CIO of Nissan, Celso Guiotoko

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68 UTILIZING DATA TO DRIVE CHANGE Interview with the CIO of British Gas, David Cooper

FUNDING FOCUS

The Global Top 50 Tech VC Deals: Q1, 2016 The reports suggest that Q1 2016, as with Q4 2015, saw a decline in VC activity across all markets. A sleepy IPO market and skepticism of inflated startup valuations, has meant that VCs are becoming more selective with their money. Despite this reality, Q1 2016 still saw $25.5 billion invested across nearly 2,000 deals.

In partnership with Pitchbook, we have presented the top 50 of those deals across sub-sectors within tech, to include; software, cloud computing, marketplaces, health, finance and gaming. The slowdown is real but so is the ongoing potential for huge returns within a tech space that is no longer a vertical but instead a facilitator for growth and innovation in every sector on a global basis.

Software

Cloud Computing

E-Commerce

Meituan-Dianping $3.3bn Apttus $255m Yunniao.me $100m Anaplan $90m ForeScout $76m Mesosphere $73.57m Stratoscale $70m

Lecloud Fuze Procore Technologies

Souq.com Snapdeal Shopclues.com Boxed Mercari Wadi

In partnership with

$150m $112m $80m

Energy $275m $200m $150m $100m $75m $67m

Solexel

$100.70m

Health The CIO Edition

Networking

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Kymeta

$62m

Business Intelligence Domo

Education HotChalk Byju’s

$366m

Security 6

Pindrop Security

$75m

$83.10m $80m

Oscar Flatiron Health Medgate MindMaze Guardant Health Acutus Medical Health Catalyst Carbon Black

$400m $175m $100m $100m $82m $75m $70m $14m

Highlights

Most active VC:

Total value monitored:

Largest deal:

Sequoia Capital

$13.618bn $3,3BN

FUNDING FOCUS

Meituan-Dianping (Software)

Finance & Banking

Investment

WeLab LendUp Kreditech

Betterment

$160m $150m $103m

Wearables Magic Leap Jawbone

$100m

Marketplaces $793.5m $165m

Uber Technologies Lyft Dada Cartrade.com Gusto.com

Gaming

Snapchat

Garena Razer

$712.64m

Commercial Products

$2bn $1bn $300m $141.4m $66.75m

Insurance MetroMile

Mobile Messaging

SJSemi

Web Analytics $280m

Online Music $73m

Deezer

$170m $75m

Real Matters App Annie

$76.85m $63m

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$110m

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Mobile Yello Mobile

$73m

CIO FEATURE

Telefónica Phil Jordan CIO

THE ECONOMICS BEHIND DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION The economic crisis of 2011 saw businesses fall like dominos. For Telefónica, it was the wake up call showing them digital transformation was a necessity. This is what Phil Jordan, CIO of Telefónica had to say.

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Few sectors weathered the economic crisis like the telecoms industry. Those fortunate enough to escape unscathed were reminded of the potential pitfalls that come with being unprepared. Some commentators put the unwavering resilience down to a reduction in prices, which, driven by regulation and competition was already being done before the downturn. Others suggested it was a result of the innovative nature of the industry, or for European telcos, the fact many took advantage of their existing footprint in mature markets. Whatever the reason, there’s no escaping that it was not plain sailing. Businesses fell like dominos and the woes of the broader economy seemed unending. Spain, where Telefónica is based was once the poster boy for European growth. Compare its creation of 1 in 3 Eurozone jobs in its heyday to the staggering 57.7% peak youth unemployment figures released in early

2014 as proof of just how engulfed the country was. The scale and depth of the macro economic challenge ensured our eyes were opened to the realization that profound and sustainable digital transformation was a necessity. To ensure it would limit suffering in the case of further economic challenges, but, more importantly to ensure we became future proof in the face of competition from a new generation of digital telecoms businesses threatening to create a new kind of crisis which, this time, would have been harder to overcome. And so in 2012, well into the digital revolution, we began our journey to digital transformation. What took the industry so long to commit to digital change? The great thing about the telecoms industry over the last 15 years has been demand. The unparalleled thirst for data that came with the smartphone revolution and the digitization of

CIO FEATURE

Telefónica Phil Jordan CIO

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CIO FEATURE

Telefónica Phil Jordan CIO

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businesses meant exceptional demand for core connectivity products. However, as history has shown with leading technology companies that experienced similar fortunes, there has often been a degree of complacency from the industry service providers. Telecom Companies were making a lot of money based on pioneering innovation at the creation of the sector. However, as growth and margins were strong and the industry matured, the innovation slowed and the door was open for disruption. It revelled in its own success to the point that it missed the foreboding warning of the startup storm knocking at the door. The failure to act, led to titans being out

innovated by new, nimble digital players that took advantage of lowered barriers to entry. The Viber’s and WhatsApp’s of the industry saw the huge margins being made and thought it was a great industry to disrupt. They were right, and these digital players turned the industry on its head by targeting core products that made the giants so successful in the first place. WhatsApp for example started with messaging, and has since expanded out to voice calls. It is now closing in on a billion users. Had we have been more innovative we could have spotted it coming and protected ourselves better than we did. The question faced now is how to compete? How

“The entire industry has seen huge growth and been very successful without trying particularly hard.”

to protect the rest of our value chains? Finally, how do you grow your business out to different areas? Change, everything. The answer began with digital transformation, which for Telefónica was impossible to begin without an aggressive simplification process. This was a result of the sheer complexity of old processes, old business models, products and technologies. And so we entered a simplification activity covering things like data centre optimization and infrastructure virtualization, as well as switching off a lot of legacy systems that were sapping productivity.

Jordan says, ‘we turned from a business doing very little by way of transformative change, to a business now doing nothing but transformative change.’

CIO FEATURE

Telefónica Once that had been completed we were 2,000 systems lighter and ready for truly transformative change. We kicked off with the re-implementation of business processes, policies and systems, paving the way for a full-stack multi-national digital transformation across 15 countries in parallel, based on a standardized process footprint. This was a huge investment in digitization and radically different compared to the Telefónica of the past. Essentially we turned from a business doing very little by way of transformative change, to a business now doing nothing but transformative change. This cannot be understated, as it paved the way for the ace up our sleeve; customer data, and lots of it, which we know is our number 1 sustainable differentiator and biggest opportunity due to our unique customer relationship and long history of protecting privacy and security We have billing relationships; geographical data, browsing data and knowledge of what our customers spend their money on. We know how sensitive and powerful this is and what’s more we have full trust from our customers, which can be used to our advantage. Ensuring this information is digitized in the right way will open up new means of context-sensitive interactions and enriched propositions based on customer data, and will truly transform the way brands interact with individuals for the better. Compare this to over-the-top players who don’t necessarily see their users in 360 degrees. These businesses infer data, and use algorithms to build a view of a customer, yet this is actual information that telecoms businesses already have. Now, we have to be a lot smarter and slicker about how we change to ensure seamless data flows across our business that can be used with ease, but we truly think identity and privacy is set to be a real opportunity for us in the future. We have the credibility from our history and we’re expecting it to be an important future differentiator too. l

Phil Jordan CIO

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INTERVIEW

ForgeRock Mike Ellis CEO

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IN IDENTITY WE TRUST

Trust shouldn’t be honored. It should be incorporated.

INTERVIEW

As the physical and digital worlds coalesce, customers expect a seamless experience across channels. Mike Ellis, CEO of ForgeRock, believes the key to achieving this is through digital identity management: “the most strategic element of corporate digital transformation.” In its simplest form, identity management creates digital identities for users, devices, and internetconnected things. It establishes and enforces the rules for what they can do online. “From a technological perspective,” says Ellis, “it’s the common component that connects the enterprise with a plethora of ecosystems, be they customers, suppliers, employees, devices, or machines.” And every business, government, and institution today needs to implement digital identity management systems to provide secure services online. “Companies over the years were built up with multiple infrastructures across multiple divisions of their companies,” Ellis explains, “many of which have different IT processes entirely.” Originally, digital identities were siloed across these different systems, leading to users with multiple identities within an organization. This resulted in disjointed, impersonal customer experiences. Today, businesses need to streamline their products and services with digital technology. The current digital transformation is creating connected digital ecosystems in which users, devices, and things can form relationships. This means digital identities need to be unified across all systems so that organizations have a unified view of the customer. This, in turn, is necessary for companies looking to seamlessly deliver products and services, tailored to their particular customers, across all of these new channels. Creating an omnichannel customer experience has become top priority for corporate leadership. Recognizing the customer no matter what device

ForgeRock Mike Ellis CEO

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INTERVIEW

ForgeRock Mike Ellis CEO

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“The current digital transformation is creating connected digital ecosystems in which users, devices, and things can form relationships.” they are using increases customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. “Every single enterprise worldwide is trying to understand how best they can create a single view of their most important asset,” says Ellis. “Which happens to be the customer.” Unifying customer identities provides businesses with a mountain of valuable customer data that is fundamental to personalization and understanding the needs and demands of the customer. But that is easier said than done. Before customers are willing to share data with organizations, they need to trust them. “It’s about understanding not only who your customers, employees, and suppliers are, but knowing more about them and providing a trust and consent equation alongside that,” Ellis says. “So they understand you’re honoring the knowledge you have about them with respect.” Gaining and keeping customer trust is critical for organizations that want to undergo a successful digital transformation. Secure data sharing is critical for businesses that want to deliver next-generation digital services, be it through traditional channels or more innovative ones like the internet of things (IoT). Ellis thinks that using an, “open platform based on open standards,” creates an environment of highly aware, secure, digital engagement that establishes customer trust. ForgeRock is the only complete, open source platform for digital identity in the world. This puts it in a unique position to enable the technology that builds privacy and trust for businesses. Securing the digital identities of customers–and providing a way for them to consent to data sharing and control who can access their personal data–is a fundamental need for today’s organizations. This isn’t just because of the emerging EU data legislation; it’s because of the value inherent in a trusted customer relationship. l

INTERVIEW

ForgeRock Mike Ellis CEO

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CIO FEATURE

General Electric Jim Fowler CIO

THE MAN LEADING GE’S BIGGEST EVER REINVENTION GE is undergoing the biggest transformation in its 130-year history; it plans on pioneering the digitally enabled industrial enterprise. Jim Fowler, GE’s CIO, explains how.

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The future belongs to companies that can craft strategies and build their capabilities to succeed in a new phase of global competition. It is why GE is undergoing the biggest reinvention in its 130year history. This started with the divestiture of its financing arm as well as the sale of GE Appliances. Signalling a strategic shift toward a 21st century digitally-enabled industrial enterprise. It is just one part of a radical overhaul designed to transform GE into a digital industrial company that leverages information-driven intelligence for our products and processes. Big data, advanced analytics and intelligent devices that monitor production machinery will largely drive this shift, transforming the way products are designed, built and used. Given GE’s influence, pioneering such a transition carries tremendous significance. You only have to look at global industrial productivity figures to understand why. From 1990 to 2010 productivity was at 4% year over year, a figure that has since reduced to 1%. The 4% figure was a result of businesses getting

huge amounts of productivity from enterprise resource planning (ERP) and software in lean activities widely run throughout the 90s and 2000s. This has largely dried up, and after GE’s bet on big data, the next frontier of productivity lies with marrying the operational world with information technology. GE has long had the ability to collect machine data, with sensors embedded in equipment for years monitoring operational performance, but without taking into account external factors and how they would interact with the product itself. Marrying the two together, and making this enhanced data accessible were the missing parts of the puzzle, so GE got to it. We researched companies that produced high-quality data analytics, in an attempt to truly understand the behavior of machines. By collecting 50 million data variables from 10 million sensors installed on various machines, lessons were drawn from the data sets that taught GE engineers to find interesting and unique patterns in sensor data that could be used to predict the

CIO FEATURE

General Electric Jim Fowler CIO

CIO FEATURE

General Electric Jim Fowler CIO

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future performance of machines. At the center is Predix. Our cloud-based operating system is giving customers awareness to monitor and improve equipment performance. Could data help GE’s jet engines require less frequent maintenance and provide better value back to customers? By connecting maintenance records, parts and outside information such as the price of natural gas, weather and other variables, GE can prolong the lifespan of engines and save customers an average of $7 million in fuel from efficiency alone. So the longer a jet engine can stay on the wing of a plane without having to go in for maintenance, the more price, value and revenue per cycle an airline can get out of it. 130 years old and more nimble than ever Such a pivot externally has required significant change internally. With 300,000 employees globally and another 15,000 contractors, ensuring everyone is pointing in the right direction has at times been a difficult task.

Especially when lowered barriers to entry put GE in the same ballpark as nimble Silicon Valley startups, whose level of technology explains why they are increasingly laying their claim to market share. What makes these startups so efficient is the pressure and accountability that comes with uncertainty. At GE we are embracing the concept of small teams. Ten to 15 people who own an outcome or deliverable for the business working toward a common goal. The empowerment of being tasked with full accountability over a complete solution serves the added purpose of providing employees with the opportunity to see how their work is impacting the company. The second thing that keeps us nimble is aligning what we do with business values. We need $1bn in productivity over the next few years just to ensure we remain competitive with other industries. Growing our software business from a $5bn to $10bn business through Predix, and the creation of Industrial Internet applications will lead the way.

CIO FEATURE

General Electric Jim Fowler CIO

Everything GE’s IT team works on ties back to business outcomes, signalling a shift from a myopic to a holistic point of view. A layered approach to security With the incoming explosion of IoT, or what GE calls the Digital Industrial internet, data security has become a key concern for businesses delving into the digital abyss. When you consider that GE makes the world’s most critical pieces of infrastructure: jet engines, power plants, clean water devices, locomotives, and healthcare equipment, building trust is key. Therefore, reassuring customers that you are doing the right thing and helping them understand that security is not an afterthought, but rather a part of the process, is paramount. And now presented with the forthcoming Digital Industrial internet, GE has increased cyber security investment by 200% over the last five years alone. No one actually believes it is possible to perpetually thwart unauthorized entities. So focussing on product, enterprise security, and

emphasis on the ‘crown jewels’ (the codes and secrets of how the company is run) in a layered way has proved to be the ace up our sleeve. Being fast to identify, respond and continuously learn how to recover before the next attack must be coupled with a strong incident management process and capability. This is built around an intelligence arm tying event information with geopolitical, commercial and investor information. It’s about strong partnerships, game-changing technology and a world-class team. All of these things contribute to our focus on the Digital Industrial internet, a technological moment akin to the early 1990’s when the consumer internet was in its infancy. The future is becoming clear, and we are sure that changes in the technological landscape are about to enable industrial improvements immensely important to both GE and the wider global economy. l

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INTERVIEW

DRIVING DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION WORLDWIDE Hot Topics sat down with Accenture Managing Director and Global Digital Identity Lead, Rex Thexton, to discuss the challenges of becoming a digital business. From privacy to personalization, and from security to the Internet of Things (IoT), Rex shares his vision for the future in which every device and service is connected – and what it takes for companies to navigate the journey into this world successfully.

Organizations worldwide are undergoing digital transformations as they adopt new technologies to become more efficient, responsive and customerfocused. The creation of these complex new digital ecosystems creates significant internal and external challenges for the IT organization. How do you help CIOs to navigate this major transition? I work closely with the CIOs of Global 500 companies to address complex management and technology problems relating to security, infrastructure and digital identity. To help security leaders tackle the challenges of the digital economy, I lead groups that handle a variety of tasks, including strategic advising, technology implementation and security outsourcing. It’s my job to make sure that CIOs can implement a successful identity and access management infrastructure that aligns with their strategic goals, whether that’s improving customer experience, unifying customer identities or addressing complex security problems. Currently, I’m working with a global financial services institution to re-platform its global identity and access management infrastructure. I also work with organizations across several industries, including health and public services to create the strategic plan for significant digital transformations. On what kind of projects are you engaging CIOs? Are there particular initiatives or goals that organizations are prioritizing? CIOs are coming to Accenture for help with major digital transformation projects. Disruptive startups are gaining traction and winning market share. Organizations that can quickly offer new, innovative, digital products and services will win more customers than those that are slow to adapt. To stay relevant, legacy players need to shift to digital systems. That means that the identity management

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Accenture Rex Thexton MD & Global Digital Identity Lead

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infrastructures of these businesses also need to adapt to meet this new digital reality. That’s where my team comes in. There’s been a shift away from viewing digital identity as an internal, employee-centric use case that’s limited to providing security inside the enterprise firewall. To offer new digital products and services, businesses need to include customers, connected devices and the IoT in their digital ecosystems. That means identity now extends beyond the enterprise perimeter. Building secure relationships between all of these digital identities will be critical for organizations going through digital transformations. What are the biggest challenges of digital transformation? There are a number of challenges: • Businesses must contend with growing customer privacy concerns and changing data protection regulations. • They struggle to connect users, devices and services seamlessly. • They lack continuous, intelligent security, which leads to a greater risk of identity fraud and attacks by hackers. • They also tend to offer disjointed, impersonal customer experiences across channels. For example, many businesses lack a single view of each customer. Because different departments see just one little piece of each customer’s business, they’re mishandling customer service and missing out on up-sell and cross-sell opportunities. • Companies are typically saddled with restrictive, proprietary, legacy identity systems that are unable to support digital customer demands and business requirements. How do you address these challenges and regulations? Keeping data secure is not just about meeting stringent new regulations, like the EU General Data Protection Regulation, or preventing financial loss. It’s really about protecting customer loyalty and trust while enabling customers to use new, personalized digital services that require data sharing — like incentives offered by geo-location,

or services based on personal data analysis. This is what organizations need to do to differentiate themselves from the competition. We believe the solution is a flexible, scalable digital identity platform that can tie users, connected things and cloud services to digital identities and connect them all. Within this ecosystem, companies can register users, services and connected things, link them together, authorize and de-authorize their access to data and apply policies that dictate security practices and personalization. An interconnected approach like this provides a better understanding of customer needs and a way to roll out new programs quickly – like financial rewards for usage goals that customers meet on digital devices, or automatic reordering when a device senses depleted stock. When it comes to securing these new digital ecosystems, it’s not just a matter of credentials — it’s also a matter of circumstances. For example, does a particular customer usually log in from Bangladesh at 3:00 a.m. on a Samsung? There are lots of ways to authenticate his or her identity, whether that’s with text codes, emails, security questions or biometrics. With so much of the digital economy built on sharing personal data, can you explain what organizations need to do to facilitate secure datasharing? It starts with digital trust. This is the idea that customers are only willing to share their valuable personal data with businesses if they have a strong relationship with the business, and believe that it will protect their personal data. Organizations that can build digital trust with their customers can then gather and leverage valuable user data to deliver personalized products and services. To build digital trust, organizations need to ensure that personal data is kept secure and shared only with the appropriate parties. This will require an identity platform that can support flexible privacy tools like the user-managed access standard that helps companies enable customers to choose who they want to share data with, on what devices and for how long — all at IoT scale. Digital trust is something Accenture has really been focusing on this past year. It’s a trend in our

Technology Vision 2016 report because we believe it will play a significant role in shaping the market in the coming years. It’s just as important that personal data is kept secure after it’s shared. Any breach or hack that exposes personal data instantly destroys trust and has serious financial and reputational consequences. The Target hack, which cost the company more than $100 million in expenses and resulted in the eventual resignation of their CEO and CIO, is proof that executive management should prioritize protecting customer data. The security of the IoT has received greater scrutiny this past year as vulnerabilities have been discovered in connected cars and medical devices. With Gartner suggesting that as many as 20.8 billion connected devices predicted to be online by 2020, security breaches will only become more common. How can identity and access management help to address the risks of the IoT? I believe digital identity has a major role to play in securing the IoT. The problem is that most identity and access management systems were not designed for the scale and complexity of the IoT. Fortunately, there are newer vendors like ForgeRock that are developing modern identity platforms that can help organizations to securely add the IoT to their digital ecosystems. With millions of smart devices going online and countless new digital relationships being formed, all identities in the digital ecosystem need to be continuously authenticated. This way organizations can verify not only who (or what) a user is, but also which services, applications, devices and data they are permitted to access. But persistent vigilance alone is not enough to replace vulnerability with capability and ensure security. User names and passwords are easily compromised, so identity management systems must use contextual cues like time and geolocation to understand the true nature of the digital interaction. What do the next five to ten years look like for businesses undergoing digital transformations now? Digital transformation is a huge hurdle, but it’s

also a tremendous opportunity for businesses. Traditional industries must evolve to stay relevant. It’s not just about the disruption to these traditional industries but also the speed at which it is happening. For many of these companies, it’s like trying to get out of the way of an avalanche. By the time management sees it, there just isn’t enough time. Successful businesses are getting out in front of the digital opportunity. For example, consumers will buy cars as much for the technology they contain, like electronics integrations and artificial intelligence safety features, as for the driving experience. They will buy appliances for the usual aesthetic, effectiveness and efficiency reasons, but also for the automatic restock and repair features that they’ll come with. Business will also become more efficient. Just as the assembly line streamlined production in the Industrial Revolution, digital integration will streamline tasks that were once carried out by humans. Devices, apps and appliances will automatically take actions based on data. Whether that’s lowering the thermostat when the occupants of a house are at work, checking IDs, or booking travel based on parameters set out by users, there’s an enormous range of opportunities. All of this requires digital identity. Every digital user – whether that’s the customer, their device or an app – will need a consistent identity that follows them across the digital ecosystem. Because these identities carry personal preferences and data, companies can tailor their interactions with each of their customers. It also gives them a way to verify with whom they’re interacting and to what resources they should have access. Digital transformation means companies can finally move from defense to offense, reacting not just to login credentials, but also to the security situation at hand. Over time, we’ll see login credentials start to disappear entirely as businesses replace them with biometrics like thumb-prints and facial recognition. Organizations will encounter significant challenges during their digital transformation journeys, and we’re looking forward to helping our clients overcome them and adapt to perhaps the biggest market opportunity we’ve seen since the dawn of the computer era. l

Accenture Rex Thexton MD & Global Digital Identity Lead

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CIO Q&A

Pearson Albert Hitchcock CTO

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LEARNING ABOUT THE PROCESS OF LEARNING

CIO Q&A

Pearson Albert Hitchcock CTO

Pearson, the world’s largest education provider, wants to use the identity of its students to help create more personalized learning experiences. Until recently, Pearson was made up of a number of education and publishing businesses it had acquired over the years. This gave great breadth and reach to the company, encompassing thousands of products ranging from Penguin Books to OpenClass. The caveat came after recognizing that by inheriting thousands of websites, domains and social media accounts, it was stuck with the technical debt of each separate entity. The result was siloed businesses with very little connection between one another, until the company wide decision was made that it had to engage in change. After a group shift toward common platforms that include e-commerce and marketing technologies, a great opportunity was presented to the 170-year-old company. One that had the potential to beckon a clearer overall branding strategy grouped around fewer domains. Moving toward this ultimate goal has required profound digital transformation. Pearson’s Chief Technical and Operations Officer, Albert Hitchcock has led it, and he talked Hot Topics through some of the changes, explaining how the digital identity

of students would ultimately be used to help the business close the book on a lack of unification once and for all. How does Pearson plan on providing educational experiences for more students? At Pearson, we are focused on how we can create omni-channel, personalized learning at scale. For us, the answer is to create a single technology platform for the entire company to replace our multitude of duplicated technologies with a single, global platform that allows us to scale our best learning techniques to different learner groups, and markets, whilst engineering our products and services to be available on any device. Through reduced cost in the plumbing and our greater ability to scale – we can ultimately reduce the cost of learning and ensure millions more people have access to high quality education. How is digital transformation altering the way Pearson engages with customers? For Pearson, digital transformation will help us to do two things.

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CIO Q&A

Pearson Albert Hitchcock CTO

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The first will see the creation of a global foundation for our current and future digital learning products and services. We need to create a really fantastic, consumergrade user experience that matches the companies used by our target demographic each day. Google, Netflix, Facebook and Instagram are world-leaders because of the accessibility they provide on any device their users wish to engage with them on. This coupled with their user-experience design being superb and incredibly reliable, all contribute to their success. We are pushing for the same exceptionally high standards, and have begun putting in place the common technology platforms and assets – content management, data and analytics, hosting, CRM, identity management – that will enable this fundamental shift over the next few years. This approach is not revolutionary but the improvements in quality, reliability and consistency mean we can reduce learning time lost through lack of reliability, and create a ‘sticky’ experience that is delightful for customers and learners of all ages.

Of course a great UX will only get us so far. We continue to be the world’s leading learning company because we offer great content, assessment and wider education services. It is our on-going digital transformation that will revolutionize how we shape learning over the next five years. And while textbooks aren’t going away any time soon, we are seeing rapid advances in the field of adaptive and personalized learning, so we are focusing on creating tools that adapt to the specific learning needs of each student, and assessment analytics that provide teachers with a detailed understanding of their pupils’ strengths and areas of greatest need. Our goal is not simply to create interactive learning experiences but to demonstrate the efficacy of our content and improve learning outcomes too. Again, the ability to analyze each step of the learning process and to tag, reuse and adapt delivery of our content, will rely on the common technology platforms we’re putting in place now – plus they will allow us to scale the great work we do from one part of the world to another with far

CIO Q&A

Pearson Albert Hitchcock CTO

greater ease than today. Ultimately, digital technology is not a panacea in itself. Its use must always be underpinned by quality teaching. How does Pearson create a single view of the student as they move through the student lifecycle? Again, our platform strategy will underpin our ability to create a single learner identity. We are embedding a single, robust identity and access management platform that will plug into our learning products services. Not only will this significantly simplify and speed up access to learning tools, it also allows us to analyze the learning progress of each student and enrich and improve pedagogy over time, helping us to create digital learning and analytics tools that adapt to each person’s unique learning needs and style. It is in the early stages right now, but we see huge potential in what a single learner identity can help us learn about the process of learning itself.

How important is it for Pearson to ensure the privacy of student data? We believe that careful and appropriate use and analysis of data offers a real opportunity to improve learning outcomes everywhere and increase the positive impact that education has on people’s lives. Pearson’s role is as a steward rather than an owner of student data, and therefore we are governed by and adhere to the terms and conditions of our contracts with states, institutions and learners themselves. Within the bounds set out by these arrangements, we are committed to using data to improve the quality and efficacy of our services for learners. l

“Digital technology is not a panacea in itself. Its use must be underpinned by quality teaching.”

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Not long ago, the deployment of an IAM System could take years. Now with our Velocity Identity Platform, an entirely new infrastructure is up and running in mere days, if not hours. It also gives you the as-a-service flexibility and security you’ve always known would someday be possible. That’s rapid deployment, with velocity. accenture.com/security

Accenture sets ForgeRock’s infrastructure in motion.

As the responsibility for digital transformation is spread across the C-level, and tech spend following suit, one could be forgiven for assuming that the CIO is losing the boardroom power struggle. These 100 leaders would beg to differ however, and as the content in this magazine suggests, they have a case. The CIO Edition

Existing as an educator, business

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transformation specialist and a bridge between the technical and commercial functions within an enterprise, the modern CIO has to wear many hats. 29

CIO 100

“Digital technology is not a panacea in itself. Its use must be underpinned by quality teaching.”

READ THE INTERVIEW P24

Albert Hitchcock, CTO, Pearson

Albert Hitchcock Pearson

Guus Dekkers

Airbus Group

Ralf Schneider

Allianz

Maya Leibman

American Airlines

Marc Gordon

American Express

Niall O’Connor

Apple

David Smoley

AstraZeneca

Pam Parisian

AT&T

Ian Buchanan

Barclays

Johannes Schubmehl James Purnell

BBC

Colleen Dunn

Best Buy

Klaus Straub

BMW

Ted Colbert

Boeing

Mike Gibbs

David Cooper Christina Scott Financial Times

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Clive Selley

Phil Jordan Telefónica

British Gas BT

Robert Alexander

Capital One

Renaud de Barbuat

Carrefour

Julie Lagacy

Caterpillar

Rebecca Jacoby

Bayer Healthcare

Cisco

Ed Steinike

Coca Cola

Scott Alcott

Comcast

Paul Moulton

Costco Wholesale

David Mathers

Credit Suisse

Stephen Gold

CVS Health

“We’re finding that by connecting data together in different ways, we’re getting different insights on our business.”

READ THE INTERVIEW P56

CIO 100

Darrell Stein, CIO, Reckitt Benckiser Group

Jan Brecht

Daimler

Theresa Wise

Delta Air Lines

Kim Hammonds

Deutsche Bank

Dr. Markus Müller

Deutsche Telekom

Brian Franz

Diageo

Edgar Aschenbrenner

E.ON

Gilles Chauveau

EDF

Michael Brown

ExxonMobil

Timothy Campos

Facebook

Robert Carter

FedEx

Gilberto Ceresa

Fiat Group

Christina Scott

Financial Times

Marcy Klevorn

Ford Motor Company

Jim Fowler

Greg Kalinsky

GEICO

Randall Mott

General Motors

Daniel Lebeau

GlaxoSmithKline

Martin Chavez

Goldman Sachs

Ben Fried Ramón Baez

James Purnell BBC

Darrell Stein Reckitt Benckiser Group

The CIO Edition

Google

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Hewlett-Packard

Matt Carey

Home Depot

Darryl West

HSBC

Jeff Smith

IBM

Michael Laursen

IKEA

Kim Stevenson

Intel

David Cooper British Gas

CIO 100

“Creating an identity for each individual would allow us to better leverage the huge value of the data they generate.”

READ THE INTERVIEW P38

Frédéric Gimenez, CIO, Total

Eric Pearson

InterContinental Hotels Group

Jeremy Vincent

Jaguar Land Rover

Stuart McGuigan

Johnson & Johnson

Dana Deasy

Klas Bendrik Volvo

Frédéric Gimenez Total

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Jim Fowler GE

JPMorgan Chase

Jennifer Sepull

Kimberly-Clark Corp

Morteza Mahjour

Lloyds Banking Group

Josef Bogdanski

Lufthansa Group

Kathy McElligott

McKesson

Andreas Berndt

Mercedez Benz Bank

Jim Dubois

Microsoft

Mike Stone

MoD

Jim Scholefield

Nike

Celso Guiotoko

Nissan Motor

Mark Sunday

Oracle

Meir Aharoni

Orange

Linda Clement-Holmes

P&G

Albert Hitchcock

Pearson

Robert Dixon

PepsiCo

Jeff Keisling

Pfizer

Stephen Olive

Philips

Chris Broe

Post Office

Barbara Koster

Prudential

Darrell Stein

Reckitt Benckiser Group

Alan Matula

Royal Dutch Shell

Ross Meyercord

Salesforce

“GE has increased cyber security investment by 200% over the last five years alone.”

READ THE INTERVIEW P16

Jim Fowler, CIO, General Electric

Eivind Roald

SAS

Norbert Kelinjohann Michael Gorriz

Siemens Standard Chartered

Curt Garner Martha Poulter

Starbucks Starwood Hotels & Resorts

Heinz Herren Mike McNamara Phil Jordan

Swisscom Target Telefónica

Richard King

Thomson Reuters

Mitchell Klaif

TimeWarner

Christiaan de Backer

Total

Oliver Bussmann

UBS

Jane Moran

Unilever

Dave Barnes

UPS

Klas Bendrik

Verizon Communications

Walmart Stores

Timothy Theriault

Walgreens

Susan O’Day

Walt Disney

Kevin Rhein

Wells Fargo

Mike Kail Phillipp Erler Markus Nordlin

Oliver Bussmann UBS

Volvo

Karenann Terrell

David Thompson

Timothy Theriault Walgreens

TomTom

Frédéric Gimenez

Roger Gurnani

CIO 100

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Western Union Yahoo Zalando Zurich Insurance Group

Rebecca Jacoby Cisco

CIO FEATURE

Palo Alto Jonathan Reichental CIO

WHY YOUR DIGITAL FUTURE MAY ALREADY BE DETERMINED In a society where digital is ubiquitous, our past actions online may determine what happens to us in the future.

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In the coming years, the world’s virtual population will outnumber the population of earth. Practically every person will be represented in multiple ways online, creating new and vibrant communities whose virtual interactions will positively enrich the physical world around us. What’s certain, is that all of these virtual citizens will create huge amounts of data. And whilst the future of our data could empower citizens in an unprecedented manner, a single important caveat exists: the data revolution will strip citizens of much of their control over their personal information in the digital space. This has the power to re-shape our world, but as long as the right steps are taken now, the future of our data and the consequences that come with it shouldn’t be as dire as some predict. Jonathan Reichental, CIO of the City of Palo Alto, talks us through what we need to do, both as individuals and businesses to curb the potential problems that may emerge. “Most people don’t really understand the degree to which their online behavior is being recorded and

tracked” begins Reichental. “Some may have cottoned on to the fact that the purchases they make and websites they visit are being logged to help serve up relevant advertising and create unique online experiences. But what gets glossed over far too readily is the degree of monitoring that goes on within medium to larger sized websites.” “Here providers possess the ability to know the exact location of your cursor, where your finger is on a page, how long you spend there and then use that to be able to track your eyes and really work out how it is you look at a webpage.” For the majority of virtual citizens, the problem here is an absence of knowledge. And without the knowledge that these processes are happening, individuals often forget that their actions and decisions online can negatively impact their future. Let’s take the extreme example of a candidate running for President of the United States in a decade or two from now. As part of the inevitable analysis of that person’s

CIO FEATURE

Palo Alto Jonathan Reichental CIO

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CIO FEATURE

Palo Alto Jonathan Reichental CIO

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background in the lead up to the election, all of their web, smartphone and tablet habits will be fully disclosable to the public. Everyone will know what he or she has ordered on Amazon, the films they like to watch and every time they may have made a controversial comment on Facebook. Whether they like it or not, any one of these things could potentially impact the public’s perception of that individual. Extreme examples like this are reasons why “as a society and as business leaders, there needs to be a concerted effort, a proactive effort to explain what is really happening.” The big companies aren’t the problem We are beginning to see moves made by larger companies to target this absence of knowledge. These moves are perhaps the sole result of the media magnifying glass placed over dominant players like Google and Facebook in recent years. The effect of which has provided more clarity on tracking techniques, affording individuals more

control over their privacy settings over their profiles. Facebook, for example on a periodic basis, prompts users to take a look at their privacy settings to see if there is anything they would like to change. Coupling this with a simpler interface has undoubtedly had a positive effect. “Yet I don’t think it is enough,” Reichental implores. “It’s a serious topic not taken as seriously, and a partial approach to changing a particular mind-set around online privacy and security won’t be enough to protect us in the future. A recent survey on cyber security suggests 70% of businesses believe they understand the potential risks of online activity, I’m certain that this 70% weren’t taking action.” So what needs to be done? We must recognize the value to businesses of logging and recording consumer behaviour online. The incentives that come with continuing to do so are obvious, and as technology becomes increasingly sophisticated will only evolve to

CIO FEATURE

Palo Alto Jonathan Reichental CIO

become more granular and valuable. But, there will be a tipping point in the future where society will band together and demand control over the future of our data. Reichental believes that “sites clearly misusing data will be avoided, and businesses will have to adapt accordingly. This may have to happen the hard way, but I feel it will happen nonetheless.” He gives the US retailer Target as an example. In 2014 they had 40 million of their credit and debit cards hacked. For Target, an embarrassing episode and for the customers involved, a headache. This was a real shock to the system, not just for Target, but for US credit and debit card providers across the whole of the US. They realized that to avoid this kind of hack again, opting for European ‘Chip and Pin” enabled cards opposed to a simple magnetic strip would be wiser. The real challenge now, is for businesses to acheive transparency and for society to work out how much privacy and freedom we are willing to renounce. l

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“Most people don’t understand the degree to which their online behavior is being tracked”

CIO INTERVIEW

Total Frédéric Gimenez CIO

MANAGING THE IDENTITY OF EMPLOYEES AND CUSTOMERS ALIKE French energy giant Total has close to 100,000 employees. Ensuring each person has access to its networks whilst keeping intruders out is the task of its CIO, Frédéric Gimenez.

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There’s no disputing the fundamental role innovation has had to play in the gas and oil industry. Over the course of the past couple of decades, technology has steadily been redefining the realms of possibility – gas from shale, and oil from oil sands are just two examples of products that were previously too expensive or beyond the sectors technical ability. Now they are transforming marketplaces around the world. Advances ranging from 3-D and 4-D seismology, to improvements in distillation have had a profound impact on the way companies explore, drill, produce, process and distribute oil and gas. Data sits at the heart of these changes. And it is now down to identity management to help contain pressing security threats that emerge from data,

but also leverage the opportunities it presents too. Frédéric Gimenez, CIO of energy behemoth Total, explained just how important data is as a foundation for future innovation. “We have individuals working exclusively on the management of data from the earth and its subsurface to determine whether or not there could be oil for extraction. It is utilized in our chain to optimize production, our platforms and logistics too.” With so much valuable data being created every day, Gimenez and other CIOs are bolstering their defences against cyber security threats. This has become increasingly necessary, as a study carried out by Tripwire pointed out. Finding that cyber-attacks in the gas and oil industry had increased between 50-100% in the past few months alone.

CIO INTERVIEW

Total Frédéric Gimenez CIO

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CIO INTERVIEW

Total Frédéric Gimenez CIO

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“Creating an identity for each individual would allow us to better leverage the huge value of the data they generate.” It is a favorite target of hackers because of the catastrophic potential to create spills or blackouts. The Shamoon virus of 2012 is one such example. Described as one of the most pervasive and sophisticated attack the industry has seen. It was a self-replicating virus that infected as many as 30,000 Saudi Aramco computers, the national oil company of Saudi Arabia, which posted revenues of $378bn in 2014. Its main function appeared to be the indiscriminate deletion of data from hard drives. Although there was no oil spill, or any kind of catastrophe, the attack dramatically impacted Saudi Aramco business processes. Identity management can be a means of targeting such problems. And organizations have for a long time leveraged it in one form or another to stem the leakage of resources to unauthorized entities. Before the digital revolution, bank managers would ask for a passport or valid ID before continuing in conversations. Pharmacy staff would ask for an ID before handing over prescription medication, and doctors needed to ensure that the individual sitting before them was who they said they were before divulging any personal information. The same principle applies for individuals working in corporations, explains Gimenez. “Each of Total’s 96,000 employees has his or her own digital identity within our IT system. It gives them differing level of access to information based on their role, geography and seniority, and is necessary both for security, and efficiency.” “Identity management becomes more important still when you consider the dozens of thousands of contractors we work with that have access to our information systems.” Ubiquitous connectivity to corporate information systems for entire employee populations has become a necessity as global information workers move across PCs, tablets and smartphones seamlessly. The days of being tethered to a desk

CIO INTERVIEW

are gone, but sensitive information has become more vulnerable. Such a wide scope of security risks has forced Total to pay a lot of attention to identity management, “to be sure that those within our information systems are who they say they are, and so that Total remains safe.” Leveraging customer data There’s another opportunity within this same remit of identity management, extending beyond security and into the realms of marketing. With huge pressure being put on businesses to focus on the way products are sold, and as device and channel fragmentation continues to increase, the desire for real-time interaction and personalized contextual experiences grows with it. Gimenez believes that, “knowing how to manage the identity of millions of customers is increasingly becoming an opportunity.” In order to meet the growing desire for truly compelling experiences, businesses are starting to harness marketing technology infrastructure and data strategy around a single, comprehensive source of truth: the customer identity. “Total has millions of people coming in and out of its service stations every single day. Creating an identity for each individual would allow us to better leverage the huge value of the data they generate.” “All we know is that they have come in and bought something. The clear value for our marketing activities would be to gain a better understanding of each individual. What do they buy? What are their consumption patterns? It would make defining particular trends significantly easier, and targeting individuals easier too.” This becomes particularly salient when Gimenez highlighted the sheer openness of the gas market, where brand loyalty can be particularly difficult to come by. “The price doesn’t have to be the only thing drawing in customers; rather, we want to be smarter and go beyond this basic allure.” Providing personalized and contextualized experiences could really help differentiate brands from their competitors and, as such, identity management could play a key role. l

Total Frédéric Gimenez CIO

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CIO SNAPSHOT

FCA Group Gilberto Ceresa CIO

PUTTING DIGITAL IN THE DRIVING SEAT Championing digital and creating a unified customer view is the secret behind the success of one the world’s largest carmakers. So says, Fiat Crysler Automobile CIO, Gilberto Ceresa.

The future of the automotive industry will be increasingly linked to the successful integration of digital identity-management in vehicles. At FIAT Chrysler Automobiles we are exploring how best to leverage customer data to ensure a single, unified view of our customers at every stage, from product development and car design to customer relationship management. As IT, we ensure that everything that requires digitizing can flow seamlessly from design to factory and can be integrated into each vehicle from the very beginning. This is hugely important because digital is as critical to the customer-purchasing journey of a new vehicle as it is for the rest of a car’s life cycle. After all, 92% of customers choose their car specification over the Internet – they go online before they do

anything else. With this in mind, digital is no longer a channel. CIOs increasingly must understand their customers from the start and leverage the power of their digital tools to ensure businesses remain close to their customers, gain an idea of what they do and don’t like, and in FCA’s case, encourage customers to head toward the dealership. Championing digital and creating a unified customer view is the catalyst here. It allows us to manage user data not only to boost sales, but to simultaneously provide great customer experiences, features and differentiating experiences like EcoDrive. Our EcoDrive software collects detailed environmental performance metrics, including overall fuel economy, speed, gear changes, engine

CIO SNAPSHOT

FCA Group Gilberto Ceresa CIO

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CIO SNAPSHOT

FCA Group Gilberto Ceresa CIO

“Ensuring customer data is kept securely and used in a way that will inspire and maintain trust should now be at the forefront of every CIO’s mind.”

CIO SNAPSHOT

FCA Group Gilberto Ceresa CIO

revs, throttle openings etc, from every single trip. The software then makes recommendations about how best to modify one’s driving style to reduce expended emissions and fuel, in real time, on the vehicle’s display and through accumulated data on the website. You may be thinking: that’s pretty obvious? Just take your foot off the gas a little more. Although emissions produced by a vehicle, a lot like mileage can fluctuate according to a huge number of factors beyond drivers simply putting pedal to metal in an attempt to replicate their favorite F1 drivers. For example, when and how you brake or shift gears, how well you maintain your car, the ambient temperature, your tyre pressures –all contribute and are part of the EcoDrive suggestions too. It highlights all of these parameters and challenges drivers to use them to their advantage, fostering the growth of their eco-friendly score which they are invited to share and compete against other EcoDrive participants online. The result? EcoDrive customers save on average 6-16% more fuel than those without it. It is these kinds of services that leverage customer data and are incredibly valuable. Although there is a caveat: the only way to access experiences like EcoDrive and most web-based services is by granting access to personal data. Customers have varying levels of concern depending on their digital knowledge and experience. As you would expect, younger

customers that grew up with the Internet and for whom connected devices have always been part and parcel of their everyday lives tend to be less worried. Those more reluctant to give up data quite simply are not able to take part in these experiences, because FCA, like many other corporates strongly respect data regulations. So much so that every new experience or service on our website requires consent to be accessed. If consent isn’t given, we are unable to grant access. However it is the jobs of corporations and businesses globally to help build the trust required for customers to want to opt-in to these experiences without worry that their data will be breached or used in the wrong way. With so many brand experiences emerging as a result of smarter use of customer data, businesses need to take more care than ever. Ensuring customer data is kept securely and used in a way that will inspire and maintain trust should now be at the forefront of every CIO’s mind. If security concerns undermine consumer trust, you can bet that organizations will be seriously hit. The rules have changed. And being in charge of the way customer data is used at FCA, I understand just how important it is to maintain this trust. As such I am doing everything in my power to ensure the highest level of customer data security, of which I believe identity management is key. l

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INTERVIEW CIO FEATURE

FT Christina Scott CIO

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MOVING WITH THE TIMES

Digital transformation is not easy. The process has to be evolutionary. Christina Scott, CIO of the Financial Times talks us through her experience.

CIO FEATURE

FT Christina Scott CIO

There is more to digital transformation than meets the eye. Most assume the shift is rudimentary; simply a matter of switching off old legacy systems to beckon a bright, fresh faced digital future for your business. And whilst the future is bright, stretching way past papery two-dimensional offerings – the road to digital transformation is not easy. Rather, it is an evolutionary process, and if it is to be successful it has to occur in stages. Iteration is the name of the game and this is exactly the approach we took when taking the Financial Times online. Out with the old, in with the new In the world of old media, the newspaper was the ‘product.’ It was everything. Its success ultimately came down to the prowess of the editorial teams responsible for the papers look, feel and content. However, with print products it is significantly harder to collect customer feedback and insight on individuals reading habits. So to us, championing digital distribution early on was hugely important. We recognized the untapped potential of customer insight, and it was going to be game changing. It is what spurred us to take the bold jump from the old world into the new, and like most news organizations our first step, quite simply, was to take the print product and move it online. We weren’t necessarily thinking about the user

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CIO FEATURE

FT Christina Scott CIO

“With so much data on offer, it can become quite easy to fall into the trap of collecting data for data’s sake.”

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experience through a digital lens at this point, rather we just pixelated print. This approach allowed our customers to evolve with us as we went through the digital transformation process. And this was pivotal as it occurred around the same time smartphones and tablets really started to gain traction. Our customers, I think, were comforted by the simplicity of our offering at the start. It wasn’t challenging for loyal customers to head online because it was so familiar. It certainly helped retention in a rapidly changing world that had the potential to leave many by the wayside. The next stage was not so simple. We set ourselves the challenge of being relevant to newer customers. This meant thinking about the product in an entirely different way. What could we do to make it relevant to people who were digitally native? This was so much more than thinking, “here are some sections from the newspaper that we have put

online”, but rather we had to think about creating an online experience to accompany the content. The best way of doing this, we found, was through learning more about our customers through data. As we learnt more and recognized the plethora of ways in which readers came across articles online, we recognized a complexity which went beyond simply finding content through the home page. Users were discovering content though social and a number of other means too. This realisation helped shape user experience accordingly, allowing us to think holistically beyond the FT ecosystem. From data to insight With so much data on offer, it can become quite easy to fall into the trap of collecting data for data’s sake. And with so many ways of extracting data, businesses can struggle to glean valuable insight from a sea of numbers that lack context. The FT’s lifecycle of data usage began cautiously, evolving out of some of the commercial areas to

CIO FEATURE

The CIO Edition

help create more targeted advertising and ensure the right people saw the right promotions at the right time. Our plan was never to go off and build a huge data warehouse, rather, to start slowly and prove the value of data in a couple of areas, and then expand that out into other areas of the company. Our initial testing worked well and now all areas of the FT have insight and make decisions based on data- from the newsroom, to commercial, all the way through to product. This was definitely the right option. Rather than going off and collecting as much data as possible,

we were able to prove its value, which in the long term is testament to the sheer power of data when used in the right way. So for me, when undertaking the digital transformation process – being clear about a few key items of customer data, proving its value and then building on top of that proven data is key. With so much going on, it can become quite easy to confuse yourself and your organization about how to most sensibly use data. The days of guessing on behalf of our customers are well and truly dead. l

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The Top 40 exits across global tech in the first quarter of 2016 including acquisitions and IPOs. All figures in $m.

1 2

Jasper

8 9 10

$5,900.00

Telecity Group Merger/Acquisition

Meilishuo

Merger of Equals

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King Digital Entertainment

Merger/Acquisition

$3,600.00

$3,000.00

$1,400.00

WIND Mobile Merger/Acquisition

$1,207.92

Airwave Solutions Merger/Acquisition

$1,170.88

Cruise Automation IPO

$1000,00

Jupiter Shop Channel Merger/Acquisition

$827.10

Unify Merger/Acquisition

$641.19

Photobox Merger/Acquisition

$577.20

Ravello Systems Merger/Acquisition

$500.00

Xamarin

TeleCommunication Systems

Vormetric

SteelBrick

COM DEV International

Yodle

18 19 20

Merger/Acquisition

$450.00

$430.80

$416.66

$360.00

$359.00

$342.00

Media Broadcast Merger/Acquisition

$327.77

Leaba Buyout/LBO

$320.00

iSIGHT Partners Merger/Acquisition

$275.00

TOP 40 EXITS

21 22 23 24

Aesynt IPO

$275.00

Polaris Consulting & Services Merger/Acquisition

$270.00

SwiftKey Merger/Acquisition

$250.00

Gilt Merger/Acquisition

Healthland

CliniSys Group

Merger/Acquisition

IPO

$250.00

$245.31

AddThis Buyout/LBO

ShopperTrak

Bookatable

Merger/Acquisition

28 29 30

$175.00

$168.83

Smyk Merger/Acquisition

Viant

Trust International Hotel Reservation Services

IPO

Merger/Acquisition

$175.00

$156.92

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$154.00

Inventus Merger/Acquisition

$232.00

Nexidia IPO

$135.00

CommonFloor Merger/Acquisition

$200.00

Electronic Systems Protection Merger/Acquisition

$130.00

Captain Train Merger/Acquisition

$189.50

Ustream Merger/Acquisition

$130.00

Replay Technologies Merger/Acquisition

$175.00

Videofied IPO

51 $125.78

“

Volvo Klas Bendrik CIO

BY 2020, NO-ONE SHOULD BE HARMED OR KILLED IN A VOLVO

“

CIO Q&A

In the digital age businesses are gathering more customer data than ever before. Today’s CIOs need to ensure it is being used in the right way. This is what Klas Bendrik, the CIO of Volvo had to say.

CIO Q&A

Technology is driving unprecedented change in the automotive industry, enhancing customer experiences and impacting business strategy like never before. Such change has given birth to the ‘collective customer’- connected individuals indirectly shaping the products they use themselves. It follows what is happening in society more naturally and despite appearances, the vastly increased screen time we engage in may just have its upsides. It is putting a plethora of data into the hands of those shaping the products we use to improve them and create experiences like never before. Hot Topics caught up with Volvo’s Group CIO, Klas Bendrik to find out more about how CIOs are building consumer trust in the digital age.

HT: How are you utilizing data to create an enhanced relationship with customers? KB: My role has increasingly become about just that. If we look at Volvo customers, the starting point is usually to gather information around our vehicles capability and services. It begins with the online experience, moves on to an ownership experience, and finally a postpurchase experience. Data has allowed for real creativity at this final stage. If you take the Volvo in-car delivery service as an example of what data can help achieve, we are rolling out a service where goods can be delivered directly to Volvo customers in their vehicles. Data is becoming an increasingly valuable asset, not just for businesses, but for consumers too. When used correctly, technology and data has

Volvo Klas Bendrik CIO

HT: Why do you think that CIOs have become such an integral part of executive teams within automotive businesses? KB: I think we see too many CIOs not being a part of core management teams. They tend to fill the role of an IT director matching parts of the infrastructure internally rather than being given the opportunity to add much more value to consumers through technology. I mean, to some extent what we see happening today in IT more generally is the core part of these traditional operations, but also as a key enabling, driving and innovating role when it comes to future services and products. The CIO Edition hottopics.ht

CIO Q&A

Volvo Klas Bendrik CIO

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CIO Q&A

Volvo

“Part of our mission statement is that by 2020 no one should be harmed or killed in a Volvo. Everything we do is working towards that goal.”

HT: Do you currently provide customers with the ability to control their own data at Volvo? KB: Yes. We see all data as being owned by the customers themselves. Whenever we use customer data of any kind, be it to add additional value to the company or to customers themselves, it requires prior consent from the customer. The really interesting trend set to emerge will be around the willingness of individuals to part with their data. Services increasingly require customer data to provide benefits and if individuals want to be a part of that ecosystem, then of course they will need to opt in to that process.

the power to disrupt and change the structure of industries entirely. What we have done within Volvo is actually a very integrated part of our ambitions with regard to the delivery of greater experiences. We won’t use technology for technology’s sake, but for the actual delivery of additional benefits like saving time, making products more enjoyable to use, as well as giving opportunities for people to really leverage the capabilities of products.

HT: Do you think we need a new social contract drawn up for the digital age? KB: Yes, and I think I we will see some quite rapid developments in the area. This will be driven and supported by the automotive industry but also by other industries that are ahead of us. If you look at the progress that has been made in media, music and a plethora of other industries – these advancements are actually driving the development of some areas of society.

HT: The real winners in business going forwards will be those who maintain customer trust. To what extent do you agree with this sentiment? KB: For Volvo in particular, trust is such a huge part of our brand. It is part of our DNA. Safety has and always will be a core component of our heritage. You only have to look at the innovation we did around the safety belt, passive safety, active safety, now also taking interconnected safety further with some of our newer solutions. Part of our mission statement is that by 2020 no one should be harmed or killed in a Volvo. Everything we do is working towards that goal. This isn’t just about the physical realms either, because trust in the digital age is becoming an increasingly important core component of brands. This will be particularly true as we move into the unexplored domains of digitization and the question marks surrounding data privacy that come with that.

HT: Finally, what future do you see for autonomous cars? KB: We are currently seeing a lot of attention and focus around the potential capabilities of aided vehicles. It may be a few years until they are fully integrated into society though. What we are planning to do at Volvo is test these vehicles among a small group of individuals, around 180 people on the streets of Gothenburg as a starting point. The next stage after that will be giving these cars to more people in different locations and after that will be integrating them into the overall infrastructure of cities. That means tailoring each car to particular cities as road authorities can differ so dramatically. l

Klas Bendrik CIO

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CIO FEATURE

Reckitt Benckiser Darrell Stein CIO

THE THREE PILLARS BEHIND A CONNECTED COMPANY Reckitt Benckiser’s CIO, Darrell Stein, is working to make the company more connected. Here’s how.

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“You’ve got to make sure that you get your plumbing right. So you don’t get blockages when extracting data out of your systems.” That is according to Reckitt Benckiser’s (RB) CIO, Darrell Stein. The man who has overseen a fundamental overhaul of one the world’s largest health, hygiene and home consumer goods businesses, re-iterates the importance of returning to basics. This is paramount explained Stein, not simply as a company operating in an environment under the close watch of governments around the world (particularly after the European Court of Justice invalidated the Safe Harbour agreements between EU and US data transfer), but also in aiding RB’s digital transformation initiative to become what Stein calls a “connected company.” Stein’s digital vision is to allow RB to glean the most use from both internal and external data sources. To that end, much of Stein’s role has

involved engaging in a simplification of RB’s IT estate. The start of which was kicked off by a single question: “What do we need to do to our products in order to make them more digital?” Stein identified three areas that would require an overhaul in order for RB to be propelled into the world of digital, and by extension become future proof, for now at least. RB’s products line store shelves in nearly 200 countries worldwide, from Mumbai to Mexico City, with its foundation built around 19 Powerbrands.

CIO FEATURE

Reckitt Benckiser Darrell Stein CIO

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CIO FEATURE

Reckitt Benckiser Darrell Stein CIO

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Strepsils, Nurofen, Dettol and others have been central to a strategy that concentrates a large proportion of resource on a handful of strong products which contribute the majority of revenues. Stein explains that the transition towards becoming a connected company has been split into three parts. Part One – connected planning Given the pace at which retail store shelve requirements can change, ensuring RB has a robust and flexible supply chain planning system with the capability to manage demand and accelerate product returns has been at the forefront of Stein’s connected company initiative.

Stein stresses the importance of flexibility and suggested, “it is something that retail has learnt pretty quickly. As it becomes a lot more complicated you’ve got to be able to provide goods faster and more flexibly than perhaps you did previously.” “You’ve got to look at things like cross border purchasing. Consumers want to shop in one country and have the goods delivered to them in another country. So you have to think about your pricing and supply model for these places as well.” Stein explains that finding a solution to this is most definitely not as simple as the “bricks and mortar” world delivering products to the same warehouse or using different retailers.

Stein explains that some of this may be through combining internal data together, so for example, rather than sales and marketing looking at independent data sets – pooling information in real time. Such information is certainly useful when having to make quick fire decisions based on external factors. Stein references the patterns around weather or high intensity seasons as two factors that can influence product planning. Part Three – connected talent The final area Stein is turning his attention to in order to propel RB into a more connected company is through a focus on talent. With millennials fast becoming the majority of the global workforce, organizations and IT departments have to adapt accordingly. A recent Nielsen Survey stated that millennials are the most diverse, globally aware and care orientated generation. With this in mind, Stein has built the foundations required to support the right talent for a digital future. RB is dedicated to providing innovative solutions to enable healthier lives and happy homes and it attempts to live by that manta in its own office. Instead of creating an environment where 9-5 is normal, Stein wanted to help craft something considerably different. Mobility is at the heart of this initiative and Stein wanted to enable his employees to easily work from home, from different geographies and at different times of day. “Our mobile first initiative really helps support this connected talent concept. Everything just has to be available on mobile, so people can work much more easily.” Stein’s initiatives allow RB to act as a connected company within an increasingly connected world. l Rather, it is the underlying foundations that prove to be the most valuable. “You need to have more intelligent systems giving you a slicker supply chain that provides you with more personalized information predicting what consumers will want.”

“You need to have more intelligent systems giving you a slicker supply Part Two – connected data The next connected company initiative, says Stein, is chain that provides you called “connected data”. with more personalized Which he succinctly described as helping RB leverage “super-powerful analytics.” information predicting “We’re finding that by connecting data together in different ways, we’re getting different insights on what consumers want.” our business.”

CIO FEATURE

Reckitt Benckiser Darrell Stein CIO

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CIO INTERVIEW

Caterpillar Julie Legacy CIO

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SECURITY ON AN INDUSTRIAL SCALE

Digital transformation brings data security concerns to the fore. Here is how one of the world’s largest industrial companies deals with it.

CIO INTERVIEW

Caterpillar Julie Legacy CIO

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CIO INTERVIEW

Caterpillar Julie Legacy CIO

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Caterpillar’s CIO, Julie Lagacy, has been with the company for 28 years and is now helping lead a profound digital transformation to help align IT with the rest of the organization. Her route to the role, however, differs from that of the traditional CIO. Having been CFO for Caterpillar Global Mining prior to taking up office, Lagacy believes her background in finance has provided her with an aerial view of the 90-year-old organization that enables her to better connect the dots. She believes that providing value whilst protecting the data of customers should be front and center of the digital transformation efforts of any business worldwide. “I think the tension that comes with providing convenient services while upholding privacy and security of information is an incredibly important issue,” Lagacy begins. She explains that Caterpillar’s digital transformation is “adding value to customers through using data to help them better understand how machines operate, from a productivity and

safety perspective.” “If you think about the productivity of a machine, it can be driven by a number of differing factors. How that particular machine is being used, the conditions it is being used under and more can all affect output. So if we have all of this information, we can help provide customers with the opportunity to improve productivity.” Through harnessing the power of the IoT, Caterpillar is able to help customers anticipate future problems and improve their safety and productivity. They are also able to leverage that data to help inform future designs, components and equipment. A practical example of this is if you consider a Caterpillar’s bulldozer on a construction site. Given how expensive something going awry could prove to be, by monitoring all aspects of the bulldozer, Caterpillar is able to flag potential problems to customers or dealers before they happen. “For us it is about improving productivity, customer owning and operating costs and

“I can’t imagine that you would talk to any CIO today who would say that keeping their information secure wasn’t a top priority.”

overall user experience, including safety. All of these things are really part of the overall digital initiative.” Now, of course, providing these services requires the leveraging of large amounts of customer data to be effective. And with so much at risk as a result of high profile data breaches widely covered in the press, CIOs globally are required to champion data security fervently. As this trend persists, Lagacy believes those in charge of data security and information technologies have a responsibility to ensure customer data is secure. “I think this is the challenge for information security departments, to ensure that this continues to happen. I can’t imagine that you would talk to any CIO today who would say that keeping their information secure wasn’t a top priority. ” “When it comes to security, there’s no such thing as standing still. If you aren’t progressing and you are standing still, you are in effect going backwards.”

CIO INTERVIEW

Caterpillar Julie Legacy CIO

The Caterpillar approach One of Caterpillar’s core strategies to raise awareness around the importance of data security is to train staff to be as receptive to the importance of the issue as possible. By meticulously drumming home what “normal” looks like in day-to-day operations, it creates an environment where anything out of the ordinary can quickly be picked up and flagged. Once flagged, the information is then passed on to the security team at Caterpillar to take action. “It is definitely in the interest of everyone throughout the organization that this is done properly and done well. It really is critical that we maintain the safety and security of that data.” Another means of security used by Caterpillar is through the use of identity management to secure its systems. Identity helps with security because it better allows businesses to understand who exactly is in their systems, what kind of behavior is being displayed, and allows Caterpillar to easily isolate unknown entities quickly and efficiently where necessary to minimize any potential damage. It helps support the recognition of “normal” in a way that is both efficient and effective for all parties. After all, Lagacy explains, “we see security as a means of enabling business. It shouldn’t be something that slows us down or even stops it altogether.” “The challenge then becomes finding that extra layer of security to be able to provide convenience and ease of use to our customers at the same time.” l

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CIO Q&A

Nissan Celso Guiotoko CIO

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AUTONOMOUS VEHICLES’ LONG ROAD TOWARDS CONSUMER TRUST

CIO Q&A

Nissan Celso Guiotoko CIO

Nissan’s CIO is fearful of hackers. With autonomous vehicles just around the corner, here is how he plans on keeping your data safe. The Renault-Nissan alliance is a rare example of cross-cultural co-operation in a global industry. Strategic partners since 1999, the two have nearly 450,000 employees working across eight major car brands including Infiniti, Dacia, Datsun and Lada. Hot Topics caught up with the Alliance Global VP and CIO Celso Guiotoko to discuss what lies ahead for the automotive giant, including the development of the Nissan autonomous vehicle based on the Leaf electric car and the effect Nissan autonomous vehicles and the data they will generate are set have on consumer trust and privacy. Hot Topics: With IoT about to be rolled out as well as driverless cars just around the corner, this must pose issues in terms of customer data and potential hacks. What are you doing to safeguard against potential problems? Celso Guiotoko: Firstly we tend not to say driverless cars, as we are more likely to roll out autonomous cars before that will be the case. However, given that these vehicles are going to be connected to networks, we work on them in much the same way as we do our other systems.

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CIO Q&A

Nissan Celso Guiotoko CIO

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“We are unifying our efforts to help build the trust required for the industry as a whole in order to help consumers adopt new technologies going forwards.”

This is the way the group is looking at it. Everything inside the Nissan autonomous vehicle is the responsibility of IT. Everything outside of the vehicle is now the responsibility of IT too. So anything on the vehicle that is sending data to the cloud, be it from apps or web pages, is something that the IT department is jointly collaborating on with the engineering team. We took this approach because having siloed teams just doesn’t make sense. Especially when you have to go through everything at the end to test various different components. HT: A video emerged recently of an autonomous vehicle being targeted by hackers. Do you see attacks of this nature as being a big problem? CG: Definitely. We’ve been paying a lot of attention to this in terms of how we are going to ensure that connected vehicles are going to remain secure.

Just as we are discussing this now, some of our teams are getting together to talk about what the guidelines are and what the level of security required will be to implement autonomous cars or even driverless cars in the future. We have to look ahead and meticulously create very clear guidelines in terms of how we’re going to secure the connection, the vehicles and how we are going to make sure that only drivers and customers will have access to the Nissan autonomous vehicle. HT: This must mean consumer trust is an important talking point among car manufacturers worldwide. It seems like it will be the next great battleground for corporate businesses. Do you see it as an opportunity? CG: Yes definitely but consumer trust and trust building isn’t specifically the task of one team. It has to be at the back of everyone’s mind across all

CIO Q&A

Nissan Celso Guiotoko CIO

teams and we are unifying our efforts to help build the trust required for the industry as a whole in order to help consumers adopt new technologies going forwards. HT: Are there any steps in particular you are taking to help build consumer trust? CG: I think the most important thing for us right now is focusing on the Nissan autonomous vehicle that will be released. Everything we design is two years away from being released to market. This gives us a lot of time to smooth out any issues, be it from potential hackers or other means. Building consumer trust is going to be a long road, particularly in ensuring customers data and privacy is secure. It will begin with the experience of the connected vehicle.

HT: Another opportunity with the dawn of autonomous vehicles is the huge amount of data that can be gathered from customers. What opportunities do you see that come with that? CG: This is, we believe, the right direction to be heading in. It is not yet clear what exactly our business model will be and how we are set to monetize, collect data at scale and use this all to increase the turnover of the company. But we are very aware that this is what we have to do, especially as so many high growth tech companies are doing the same and have been for a very long time. We need to ensure that we prepare ourselves accordingly, and that all the right pieces are in place. This is not something to be done over a short period of time but, it is the reality we face. l

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CIO FEATURE

British Gas David Cooper CIO

UTILIZING DATA TO DRIVE CHANGE The heyday of the corporation could well be behind us. Digital transformation should be thought of as the rebirth of business. This is what British Gas CIO, David Cooper had to say.

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The case for digital transformation After crunching data from nearly 30,000 firms across the world, McKinsey Global institute believes corporate profits tripled between 1980-2013, rising from 7.6% of global GDP to 10%. That growth is the result of two key developments. The first is a globalization of markets, and as a result, the reduction of costs. Shown by the expansion of a global labor force that has grown by some 1.2 billion since 1980. The second is the decline of corporate tax rates that have fallen by half over the same period. But with twice as many multinationals than in 1990, competition has never been fiercer. It has given rise to a new era of business where large corporations are undergoing profound digital transformation. A process which can be something seemingly as simple as moving data out of silos and into the open, to be harnessed by an entire organization. Breaking down silos Gas and electricity behemoth British Gas did just that. David Cooper, its CIO since 2011, wanted

to make customer data more accessible to the company that supplies utilities to around 10.8 million British homes. His aim of creating a unified view of identity across all its services began with a clear digital transformation strategy that he hopes will make the leading ‘Big Six’ supplier a key digital player in the future. The process began by untangling the analogue mess that preceded it, where customer data sat in many different areas of the business. “Digital,” begins Cooper, “is almost like a window into a company. It allows you to see the complexity that lies within the business, systems and processes.” After all, the purpose of digital transformation is not only to provide a holistic view of customers, but a simplification of processes from top to bottom. “I’ve rationalized a lot of our applications. We had separate businesses, separate billing systems, separate CRM systems,” explains Cooper as he discusses the antiquated siloed walls that used to characterize its IT infrastructure. It is quite some overhaul. And one that many

CIO FEATURE

British Gas

large corporations are contending with, because it was common for IT infrastructure to be built in a siloed fashion, each silo with its own systems, data definitions and business processes. Naturally, this makes business processes requiring information from various parts of the company difficult. Without a common view of data, any advanced approaches to customer engagement or process optimization just aren’t possible. This becomes difficult for businesses wanting to engage in multi-channel marketing operations, which, in its simplest form means offering expanding choice to customers who desire more control over the buying processes, and certainly don’t want to be restricted to one platform or medium. For British Gas at least, this change was imperative; particularly because of the increased competitiveness of the utilities space and the number of different products it has. From Hive (British Gas’ bet on IoT), to boiler fixing, the company invested heavily in systems to provide a similar experience across all platforms. Cooper believes that the changes gave British Gas an unprecedented organizational agility to respond to customer needs, share information about customers’ across contact centres, self-service and field channels, as well as helping to develop propositions that leverage products on offer. “Imagine trying to give customers a digital view of their services whilst their data sits in multiple CRM

David Cooper CIO

British Gas supplies utilities to around 10.8 million British homes.

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British Gas investment into the connected home space, Hive

“The biggest problem that we had, and I’m sure most FTSE companies will also have is what to do with their data.”

CIO FEATURE

“Digitize as much of the company, so customers are able to control their everyday lives.”

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and billing systems,” Cooper says. Suggesting, “it becomes impossible to provide a holistic customer view.” A survey by Capgemini suggests that, “data integration when setting up new services,” is one of the biggest challenges faced by executives today. It was an obstacle Cooper and his team overcame by implementing a data lake. Initially starting out as an interesting R&D project, British Gas executives fast realized that the technology would revolutionize the way data was exploited to create commercial value. “The biggest problem that we had, and I’m sure most FTSE companies will also have is what to do with their data. All of it is so fragmented, so we took the approach of investing in new technologies. We have a data lake, a deep deploy. What’s more is that we have aggregated data to be able to look back in time too.” Unlocking all of this data has had some profound consequences across the business, and also for the 8,000 or so engineers working out in the field. “Now, when an engineer comes to mend your

boiler, they can see on their iPhone the services you buy from us, how many times you have had your boiler mended previously and whether or not you have any outstanding complaints. They know everything about you, whereas before they went in blind.” It comes to show the true power that comes from breaking down silos within IT infrastructure. And the aim for British Gas is to, “digitize as much of the company, so customers are able to control their everyday lives.” l

“The biggest problem that we had, and I’m sure most FTSE companies will also have is what to do with their data.”