Hong Kong, China. Leading telecommunications and connectivity
company Telstra has released new research in conjunction with The Economist
Intelligence Unit revealing the growing role that partnerships are playing in
the development of new business opportunities across Asia-Pacific.
Dr Spincer Koh, CEO of Gorilla Technology Group, speaking with
(left to right) Jim Clarke and Jim Fagan of Telstra Global Enterprise &
Services, and Charles Ross of The Economist Intelligence Unit, at the
“Strategic Partnerships for the Digital Age” forum hosted by Telstra.
Jim Clarke, Director for Marketing, Products & Pricing, Telstra Global
Enterprise and Services, said that Telstra’s research confirms that across
multiple industries the pace of technology change is so great that to keep up,
most successful global businesses are pursuing strategies based on the power of
many.
“It is not that the age of in-house R&D and product development is dead,
but in many industries you just can’t go it alone anymore,” Jim Clarke said.
The research surveyed over 1000 senior executives across 20 different industry
types, sampled from the US, Europe, Middle-East and Asia. 51 of those surveyed
were based in Hong Kong.
According to Telstra’s research, while Hong Kong is one of the early adopters
of digital partnerships in the Asia-Pacific region, only behind Australia and
Japan, the leaders of Hong Kong companies still lean toward traditional forms
or partnerships such as joint ventures (55 per cent) and strategic alliances
(30 per cent). More than half of those surveyed view digital partnerships as a
way to enter new markets or develop new customer segments, but not develop new
products or fuel innovation.
Gorilla CEO Dr Spincer Koh highlighted the importance of partnerships for
achieving both: “For example, we are currently working with Telstra to leverage
their global cloud and telecommunications infrastructure to capture new
opportunities for our core technology platform across industries as diverse as
retail, public safety, digital banking, industry automation, home and business
security, broadcast and unified communication. It’s a win-win; we get access to
Telstra’s infrastructure and global market reach, while Telstra can expand
their product suite and broaden the range of services Telstra offers to their
traditional customer base,” said Dr Koh.
Asked about what factors he sees as being essential to driving growth across
different sectors and different regions, Dr Koh responded: “We see software as
the key enabler of various industry-specific applications. The IOT device
ecosystem is becoming increasingly complicated, so what’s needed is a common
technology platform to connect these devices – especially in the field of
analyzing video big data. What Gorilla offers is a core software platform
driven by a single platform, multiple applications, multiple industries
concept."
Dr Koh explained that while each region has its own requirements, a single
technology platform provides the building blocks for innovating all kinds of
big data services. He anticipated that Gorilla will form multiple partnerships
to take advantage of these opportunities, right across Asia-Pacific.
“These days, partnerships are really the only way to bring transformative
technologies to existing markets at scale, while allowing Gorilla to branch out
to new industries,” Dr Koh said.
In February this year the investment arm of Telstra bought a stake in Gorilla
based on each company’s synergies in offering global cloud services across a
range of verticals, including professional and enterprise media, smart retail,
security and safety.
