Why network infrastructure upgrades are essential during digital transformation
Digital Transformation can radically improve the performance or competitive advantage of an organization, and it’s on everyone’s mind. And rightly so. New technologies such as AI, IoT, and smart devices bring with them new opportunities to tackle current and future challenges. But can your existing network infrastructure and strategy guarantee secure access to all these new technologies?
The fundamental reasons all businesses need a network infrastructure upgrade
These days, business and IT have been intertwined to meet the challenges of rising competition from outside the traditional markets or geographies. At the same time, customers are demanding faster delivery, better products, and improved services.
But internal demands are changing too. Employees need to work from home or anywhere on the road and the executive board wants to steer the company based on data – lots of data – in order to scale accordingly.
In other words, your business needs to digitally transform to keep pace with it all, and that means a network infrastructure upgrade to keep up your digital transformation. It looks like a chicken and egg scenario, but the two can be managed together with the right digital transformation strategy and managed service provider handling your network infrastructure upgrade.
What elements of digital transformation can impact your network infrastructure?
Most companies have a need to digitally transform, but the opportunities and challenges for international companies are much greater.
On the one hand, you have access to a bigger pool of specialists and experts to help you grow. You can expand one branch and scale down another. You can invest in different services or products based on the specific interests of the local customer base. In other words, you have bigger opportunities because you’re more flexible.
However, an extra layer of complexity is also added because you are increasingly scattered across the globe. To understand the implications of digitally transforming an international company and how this might require an upgrade to your network infrastructure, consider the following:
- Where, for example, are your applications hosted?
- How can you easily connect users that are located on the other side of the world?
- How do you make sure all your local IT infrastructures are connected in order to manage your company globally?
- How do you bring all the data you collect over the entire world together in one place so you can steer your company based on all the data, not just a subset of it?
The benefits of upgrading your network infrastructure for digital transformation
Ultimately, upgrading your network infrastructure to support digital transformation initiatives empowers your organization to leverage emerging technologies and drive competitive advantage in today's digital landscape.
Some specific benefits include:
- Enhanced scalability, allowing your network to accommodate increased data volumes and user demands as your business grows.
- Improved performance, enabling faster data transfer speeds, reduced latency, and enhanced reliability for critical applications and services.
- Seamless integration with cloud-based platforms and services, enabling agility and innovation
- Enhanced security features safeguard against evolving cyber threats, ensuring data confidentiality and compliance.
What are the most practical ways to upgrade your network infrastructure for digital transformation?
In traditional situations, technologies were often on-premise. That meant that every office and branch needed to have the same solutions installed and you needed a local IT department to do that.
If you had a central data center you probably had private MPLS lines. That was the safest solution but could impact your budget and performance. This isn’t ideal if customers demand faster delivery, for example.
So, if you want to embrace the digital transformation, you’ll need to upgrade your network too. A lot of companies use the cloud for this exact reason. You can easily access data centers and applications, no matter whether you’re at the office, working remotely or at the customer’s site. But at the same time, you want to keep your data and that of your customers safe.
Luckily, you can do this with SD-WAN or SASE, overlay networks that reroute traffic on the basis of performance and security policies.
The bottom line: A network infrastructure upgrade is essential
The business might want to develop a new flashy app or roll out the next collaboration tool. But upgrading your network will be rewarding for the business as well. To give you just one example: employee productivity will increase because working on the road or at home will never be faster or more secure. Which of course positively impacts customer satisfaction as well.
Looking for network solutions that will accelerate your digital transformation plans?
At Expereo, we make sure our customers are completely taken care of when it comes to finding the right connectivity solution to meet their unique needs.
Together, we make a selection of the best technology, help implement the solutions, and support you 24/7, monitoring your network for threats and vulnerabilities so you can focus on transforming your business.