There’s no question about it: the pandemic has strengthened some industries over others. But that still begs the question – why? Well, I wrote this article today to dive a little bit deeper into that. And let me tell you, there’s one clear link among the so-called “winners” of the post-pandemic economy: digital acceleration.
As some have argued before, digital acceleration stands today as the smartest way to move forward in this transformative period. The companies that have rapidly implemented powerful technologies (like cloud computing and artificial intelligence) have clearly gained the resilience to sustain their business model and continue providing value to their customers in these trying times.
However, not everyone has the necessary talent onboard to power a comprehensive digital acceleration from the inside. That’s why so many organizations are leveraging software outsourcing services to instantly add the expertise of senior IT professionals to their roster.
With all that said, let’s take a look at the industries that were actually strengthened by the COVID-19 pandemic.
1. Healthcare
We can begin with the most critical industry in the current framework: healthcare. As essential as it is in our fight against the coronavirus, the industry has faced tremendous challenges that pushed innovation and growth. From hospital infrastructure and medical equipment to diagnostics and pharmaceuticals, there seems to be no area of the healthcare industry that hasn’t started a new path of evolution today.
Practically every government in the world has committed to a new investment strategy for their national healthcare industries in preparation for future emergencies like this one. Similarly, both the private and public sectors are rapidly transitioning into telehealth alternatives to adapt to our new tech-driven world.
This has also driven the growth of custom healthcare IT solutions, designed to provide patients with the information, guidance, and general health updates they would need for their own wellness. Almost every major player in the healthcare sector has shifted its focus towards digital acceleration to provide the services the world needs right now more than anything else.
2. Education
Education technology or EdTech is playing a revamped role in our society. With social distancing restrictions taking place almost in every corner of the world, humanity was calling for a way to continue education for people of all ages. Believe it or not, there are millions of people who hadn’t had any e-learning classes before the pandemic. Naturally, this drove the exponential growth of user bases at EdTech companies and it’s giving the industry the much-needed data to improve its services faster than ever before.
The traditional teaching standards most of us grew up with are becoming a thing of the past, from pre-school to higher education. Flexibility and accessibility stand today as the core principles of education technology, both of which will help upskill massive workforces as people transition from less-demanded fields to other critical professions today.
3. E-commerce
In times like these, being pushed to the limit will continue forcing e-commerce into developing innovative short and long-term tactics. Businesses need to shift towards e-commerce not just because of the benefits it will bring, but also because it’s one of the best ways we can fight the pandemic.
As we all know, e-commerce was already on the rise before the global outbreak. Yet, social distancing and operational restrictions brought everyone into the game. People are buying online more than ever before and there’s a good chance this trend will continue in the post-pandemic world, as many are reluctant to revive old shopping habits out of fear of contagion while others are getting used to buying online.
The rapid changes in habits and preferences of millions of consumers have redefined most of what e-commerce businesses swore by just a few months ago. While the industry has strengthened as a whole, most retailers will still have to face tough competition and balance risk to survive the pandemic. We are seeing and will continue to see a growing set of products and services joining the e-commerce industry.
4. Cybersecurity
This is another topic we at BairesDev have talked about before. With practically every business in the world turning to digital acceleration almost at the same time, it was just a matter of time (and a short one at that) for cyberattacks to start hitting the news. Why? Because not everyone has easy access to cybersecurity professionals, and taking critical business operations to the digital world without the proper assessment can rapidly uncover exploitable vulnerabilities.
No matter the industry or the size of the business, this new playing field requires every organization to revisit its cybersecurity strategy. While there are many simple tasks that should get most businesses a solid-enough digital defense (which you can find in the article linked above), the cybersecurity industry has grown rapidly because for most organizations that’s just not enough, particularly at the enterprise level.
This has resulted in the rapid development of new forms of custom cybersecurity solutions and strategies that rely on cutting-edge technologies like blockchain and deep learning. However, keep in mind that the sophistication and volume of cyber attackers are always on the rise. Cybersecurity is a habit.
5. Logistics
Supply chain management was perhaps one of the most affected fields at the start of the pandemic. Hundreds of thousands of businesses found themselves unable to deliver their products and services to customers because of the strict, but rather necessary, restrictions that took place during the first few months of the outbreak.
However, something good always seems to come from something bad, and this immediately drove innovation across the entire logistics industry. Technologies like the Internet of Things and Predictive Analytics took over the core operations of many logistics companies, leaving behind almost every strategy based on single-source dependencies.
Now, robotics and automation have begun to play a critical role in the logistics framework, and logistics software development companies are focusing on the best technologies to manage high-velocity operations demanded by the new e-commerce environment and almost every industry that has adopted digital acceleration today.
The Takeaway
There’s one clear bottom line we can extract from what all of these industries are doing: agility, scalability, and automation are essential in any strategy in the new era of business. With digital acceleration at the forefront of these transformative times, every organization must take a deep look at what they can do to power innovation through technology. The actions taken today will have a powerful ripple effect on what our world will look like in the years to come.
