Business Networks Fuel Next Wave Of Innovation And Productivity

Nearly 14 billion years ago, massive forces of gravity and friction converged to spark the big bang that gave life to the universe as we know it. The same convergence is now happening in the business world. And industry watchers say it will fuel the next wave of innovation and productivity. In a newly released podcast, industry watchers explore how digital communities and big data are coming together to help companies achieve new levels of performance and profits - and how companies like Ariba, an SAP company and the world’s business commerce network, are driving the transformation.

“Major technology shifts like cloud computing, mobility, and social and business networks have sparked an explosion of a new class of 'unstructured' data - texts, tweets, blog posts, web-based videos, and other social postings,” said Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst, Interarbor Solutions and host of the podcast on BriefingsDirect, an IT news and trends discussion forum, “Companies that can harness this information stand poised to gain unique insights that give them significant advantage over their peers and enable them to improve their performance and profits.”

According to Gardner, business networks like the Ariba Network are the ticket to doing just this. “By and large, people recognize that the information they want is out there, and it’s simply a matter of getting the right data and executing on it,” Gardner says. “Business networks like Ariba are ready-made for this.”

Zachary Tumin, Senior Researcher at the Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program at the Harvard Kennedy School, who participated in the podcast, agrees. “The world is changing fast, and you have to be able to manage the volatility, velocity, volume and variability in order to learn and adapt,” he says. “The opportunity of the networked world is that you can share insights and loop it across the network, so that people understand how to improve every day and every way the core business processes that they're responsible for.”

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