Digital Transformation Starts with Information Capture and Kodak Alaris Solves Better than Anyone

Kodak Alaris successfully concluded the Information Management Partnership Yatra 2017, itsmajor partners meet. The multi-city event memorialized company’s strong growth in the Indian Information Management market. In a joint interaction with Leonel Da Costa, Asia Pacific Managing Director and Vivek Naidu, VP-Kodak Alaris, Information Management, the veterans politic across their strong channel partner strategies and Kodak Alaris’ technologies to help business from the growing ‘Data Chaos’. Edited Excerpts

1. India is today the pivotal focus of every company. What is Kodak Alaris’ road-map for India?

Kodak Alaris Information Management combines the science, technology and partnerships required for companies large and small to use data to drive business efficiency, growth and profitability. Our expertise is grounded in decades of imaging science and technology excellence.With changing customer expectations and diversifying needs, the Indian market in particular is presenting exciting opportunities for a business like ours.We harness the power of unstructured data by offering a range of award winning scanners, with software and a strong network of sales-partners, to bring customers a holistic set of solutions that can redefine their business.

Building on this momentum, we recently launched a unique framework called ‘IN2 ecosystem’ to take the complexity out of information capture. The framework aims to deliver-

• Right Fit by offering seamless integration into customer environments;
• Right Experience by simplifying information capture and
• Right Results by delivering superior business value and higher ROI.

The IN2 Ecosystem is not limited to Kodak Alaris’ products and services, but most notably is designed to leverage the expertise of partners to connect, configure and create new solutions that cater to unique customer requirements. With a current strength of 400+ partners across India, we are continuously evolving partner categories to ensure that the right products and solutions reach the end consumer.

2. Today the global word is ‘Data’. It has critical accolades with it too. How do you think can Information Management cap the Data Chaos to streamline enterprise business outcomes?

Today, businesses are dealing with an exponential growth of data, which includes an influx of digital documents in various formats and from multiple sources. As 90% of this data not tabled in a structured manner, it has resulted in an era of ‘data chaos. Moreover the amount of data that has been generated in the past two years itself, is more than what mankind has generated in all the years preceding these.

An inability to harness this data leads to complexity and loss in productivity. Forbes, in a statement, cited that less than 0.5% of data is ever analysed or used. This presents companies with a humongous challenge to tap into the value of their data through efficient digitalization. The question isn’t if this move needs to be made, but more importantly, where do companies begin. The answer is simple: digital transformation starts with information capture – the challenge Kodak Alaris solves better than anyone.

Information capture is at the very crux of this transformation, as deriving impactful insights is only possible if the data is captured in a definitive manner. The company combines the power of award winning scanners, with software and a strong network of sales-partners, to bring customers a holistic set of solutions that can redefine their business.

3. How strong is your ecosystem of channel partners in India and strategies envisioned to spur the channel partner base across the country?

For decades, Alaris has been at the forefront of finding new and better ways to digitize information and today’s complex data environment requires an integrated approach to information capture that includes industry leading scanners, software, services, and a global network of trusted partners.

With a current strength of 400+ partners across India, we work with a tiered channel structure that covers close to 60 cities and are continuously evolving partner categories to ensure that the right products and solutions reach the end consumer. In fact, the launch of IN2 ecosystem also aims to develop a portfolio of partners with a diverse skill-set and leverage the same to meet myriad customer demands.

Furthermore, the newly launched Alaris Partner Program is designed to enable channel partners to grow their businesses by offering best-in-class technology and sophisticated solutions and services. It includes a new partner portal, sales tools, incentives and technical resources designed to help partners win in the marketplace. We have also re-worked processes to incentivize them and communicate regularly apart from daily back-end support on any queries or grievances. Additionally, we conduct frequent technical training workshops for partners in the country through webinars.

4. Do you think there is still Information gap in enterprises as they don’t make the most out of their information? Moreover, they splurge on Information technologies but are merely aware of the outcomes and take advantage of it?

According to a recent study conducted by IDC, (commissioned by Kodak Alaris Information Management) digitization, automation, and optimization of data- and document-centric workflows are at the very foundation of digital transformation. One of the core technologies driving the transformation of document-centric workflows is information capture. Information capture not only is critical to the transition from paper-based to digital processes, but also provides a host of additional services to enable new workflows and new means of exchanging information. However, many organizations are in the early stages of document workflow transformation initiatives because of the siloed and fragmented nature of document centric business processes and insufficient information about the potential for business improvements and competitive advantage.

According to Price water house Coopers and Iron Mountain, 43 percent of companies obtain little tangible benefit from their information, while 23 percent derive no benefit whatsoever.The question for most organizations is not whether to embrace digital transformation, but where to begin.

Organizations that wish to launch an initiative to transform document-centric business workflows should begin by evaluating existing workflows and technologies. They should identify use cases with high levels of inefficiencies and stakeholder pain points —especially paper-intensive processes — and then develop a strategy to address those pain-points and begin the digital transformation journey.

5. Kodak Alaris is active in three major industries, healthcare, retail and manufacturing. What is your prime focus in India? Also, which sectors do you think to rev up in coming time complementing your offerings?

Kodak Alaris operates across verticals and has a strong presence in the BFSI, Manufacturing and the Government sectors. We focus on five horizontal areas which are paper intensive – Mailroom Automation, Records Management, Forms Processing, Customer On-boarding and Accounts Payable, which we believe can truly harness the power of data chaos.

For sectors that rely heavily on these functions, such as large BPOs and Enterprises, Banking and Finance and Government, etc., we provide a holistic framework that enables them to ease the process of scanning and placing this data into digital records, right up to deriving intelligence from it.

Our collaboration with the Government of India has contributed immensely towards our revenues and going forward, we see Retail, Logistics and Healthcare as the sunrise sectors for Information management in India.

6. Indian Government is ‘Digital-Crony’ (as I name it), is your company aligned with any projects with the government? If yes, kindly share an anecdote on the very projects and if no, then what will be the key areas you will like to align with the civic body?

The future of data transformation in India is extremely promising from the stand point of data adoption. The government sector in particular is transforming from a paper-based economy to adopting digital technologies like the e-office project which brings in digitization at the core of every business operation.

Kodak Alaris has collaborated with several government bodies at the district, state and central level to enable proper collection of data, processing and organized availability of information which is crucial for such a sector. The digital transformation of government bodies and public sector organizations from municipal bodies, registration offices and smaller division units will require Information Management solutions to achieve the overall goal of digital governance.

In light of this, we have been an active participant in the Indian Government’s program to digitize land records. We work with many State Governments to help them create district and Taluka level land record rooms. We also help digitize incremental paper which is created as a result of the sale and purchase of properties.In fact, the Government implemented Kodak Alaris’ i4000 and i5000 production grade scanners for the CENSUS Project in 2000 and 2010.

We are currently working on almost all of the mission mode projects across major states in the country. Our solutions are supported by three distinct characteristics of Science, Technology and Eco-system wherein image science techniques are utilised to capture data, efficient methodologies to integrate captured digitized documents into business applications as well as analytics to derive insights from unstructured data.

7. Lastly, how does Kodak Alaris plan to establish itself strong in India? USP and your future ledger for this bullish market?

IDC has recognised Information Management as the way forward for small, medium and big enterprises and Kodak Alaris is leading the charge in this area globally as well is in India.We are purely an Information Management company. The core of who we are is around solving the problem of data chaos and what this means for the customer at the end of the day is that if we solve the problem that they have we’re thereby helping enable a unique value proposition for our customers around the areas of Productivity, Reliability, Efficiency, Simplicity and Scalability.

Our USP is the enhanced product line which includes software like Info Input Express and Info Input as well as the augmented hardware product line like theS2000 series which offers industry first Machine-Learning based feature benefits to customers.

Going forward, our efforts will be concentrated on stronger product range, better partner ecosystem to enhance sales bandwidth, and focus on solution-selling with special emphasis on large enterprises.