1. Origins

In March 2016, Mr. Yan Lida, President of Huawei Enterprise Business Group, delivered a keynote speech at the CeBIT 2016 Global Conference, outlined main features of new ICT era. In keynote speech, Mr. Yan pointed out that as businesses around the world are experiencing an acceleration process of digitization, ICT systems are transforming from a mere supporting element to an important part of the production system. "New ICT" is a combination of a multitude of innovative technologies, including cloud computing, Big Data, SDN, 5G, and IoT. These technologies enable a new ICT architecture that features cloud-pipe-device collaboration and facilitates the evolution of the traditional IT architectures of enterprises to cloud-based architectures.^[1]

2. Characteristics

2.1. Business-Driven ICT System Development

The financial services industry has always been in the vanguard of ICT-enabled applications. Financial institutions serve immense numbers of customers and generate massive amounts of data, requiring investment in Office Automation (OA), storage, security, and service processing. Networks, distributed architectures, and system integration are also required to centrally process services and data across branches and transmit data across service systems.

Before ICT, services were handled using paper-based bankbooks and checks. Now, customers can easily complete financial transactions by telephone, network, or mobile phone. Some banks have even developed applications that allow customers to deposit money by simply taking a photo of a check.

The finance industry is just the tip of the iceberg. In the digital world, every industry is turning to new ICT for transformation. Financial institutions typically go through three phases of ICT system development. The first phase is automation: the institution employs ICT technologies to automate office and business processes, thereby improving work productivity while reducing operational costs. The second phase is integration: the institution integrates resources and streamlines business processes to improve operational efficiency and service capabilities. The last phase is intelligence: the institution introduces more ICT capabilities into core production processes to guide intelligent decision-making and production activities, implement business innovations to rapidly respond to growing customer needs, and ultimately drive business growth to stay competitive in markets.

New business models bring new requirements to the underlying ICT infrastructure, driving new ICT development. In the process, ICT has shifted from a support system that improves productivity to a production system that grows profitability. During the shift, robust data storage, computing, and communication capabilities were converged to support every aspect of enterprises, from organizational structures to production processes, business innovations, and transaction models. In the new ICT era, data will become the fourth production factor contributing to the development of production systems, just after people (labor), capital, and material.

2.2. Technology-Enabled Agile Innovation

Over time, the financial services industry has broadened services to support new trends, including credit reporting, mobile Point Of Sale (mPOS), bar code scanning, Internet banking, and direct banking. For instance, financial institutions implement credit reporting by collecting data from e-commerce websites and social media platforms, in addition to offline financial transactions; Internet banking promotes the purchase of IT products, including cloud platforms; and direct banking stimulates the purchase of customer-facing devices, such as facial recognition modules.^[2]

ICT is also breaking down boundaries across industries. As ICT capabilities continue to improve, emerging digital players are quickly advancing into every industry, accelerating potential processes, attracting target users at extremely low costs, and subverting the legacy industry framework.

Enterprises, whether traditional or high-tech, will lose the game if they fail to schedule resources to analyze user features and needs, respond to market changes instantly, and develop differentiated products ahead of competitors. Agile innovation will yield greater business value. Enterprises can derive agile innovation capabilities from new ICT technologies, particularly cloud computing and Big Data. Cloud-based information systems are the mega-drivers of ICT-enabled transformation in enterprises. Both Internet companies and traditional enterprises are actively capitalizing on cloud computing to provision cloud services in the form of an industrial cloud. Cloud computing is the universal solution to enterprises under constant pressure to meet diverse customer needs. Cloud-based ICT systems make appropriate adjustments almost instantly based on business needs and scenarios to fully exploit information resource capabilities. The new ICT systems also collect and analyze data, supporting efficient decision making and agile business innovations. The prosperity brought by Industry 4.0, Smart City, Omni-Channel Banking, and Industry digitization solutions as well as growing demand for cloud computing are proving that the new ICT is creating a sea change in traditional industries.

2.3. New, Open, Flexible Ecosystem

In the new ICT era, no enterprise can dominate a market exclusively. Building an open, flexible, new ecosystem is inevitable in the context of business development and agile innovation. What does the new ecosystem look like? Financial institutions need a wide range of technologies to implement credit reporting, mPOS, bar code scanning, cloud platforms, and facial recognition. A single enterprise cannot provide all the required technologies for the underlying infrastructure, middleware, and application layers. Enterprises must cooperate with each other to develop service system software and reinvent terminal applications and services.

For this to happen, a new ecosystem must first create new value.In traditional partnerships, partners extend and expand business value by relying on the basic capabilities provided by core vendors, creating a unidirectional value transfer process. In the new ecosystem, partners can promptly redirect customer needs to core vendors and jointly develop innovative, differentiated solutions to create new value for customers.

A new ecosystem must also be flexible and dynamic. In a new ecosystem, solutions can be delivered to customers in flexible and dynamic ways, not just through a “subcontracting” process based on ready-made products. Partners can cooperate in flexible ways, from simple agency and integration to mutual coordination and innovation. Cooperation objects can also be flexible — from private Application Programming Interface (API) to partner API and public API, signifying that more cooperation objects can be added into the ecosystem. With this approach, more dynamic, flexible solutions and benefits can be delivered to customers.

Finally, a new ecosystem must fortify cross-domain openness, simplicity, and efficiency.The capability of a single enterprise is limited. In an environment of vertical and segmented industries, more specialized and scenario-based needs require the engagement of dedicated partners. Only through cooperation with partners can enterprises fortify cross-domain openness, simplicity, and efficiency, provide better service, and create greater value for customers.