CXOInsights by CXOCIETY

Zero trust adoption in Asia has been gaining momentum, albeit with varying levels of progress across the region. While 76% of global organisations have begun implementing zero trust strategies, with 35% claiming full implementation, the Asia Pacific region shows a disparity in adoption rates . Organisations are motivated to adopt zero trust primarily to improve overall security, enhance user exper...

The rapid advancement of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) has ushered in a new era of technological innovation, offering unprecedented capabilities in content creation, problem-solving, and dare we say decision-making.  However, this transformative technology also presents complex ethical challenges that must be navigated with utmost care and responsibility.  As GenAI systems become incr...

Gartner discourse with finance leaders reveal that these very same leaders see a future for finance that is digital, scalable and data-rich. At FutureCFO conferences around Asia, a common thread keeps coming up in discussions about digital transformation, delivering value and becoming partners to the business – the importance of upskilling finance teams. Gartner says CFOs must redefine the digital...

The proliferation of synthetic identities, which are fabricated identities created by combining real and fictitious personal information, has fuelled a surge in fraud across various industries. These synthetic identities are often used to open fraudulent accounts, obtain credit or loans, and engage in other illicit activities. The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) technology has exacerbated thi...

For years, we’ve been told that consumer behaviour is changing and that businesses must adopt or go out of business. PwC says the pandemic accelerated workforce transformation even as digital adoption became one of the central tenets of our lives. Fast forward to 2024, we see a workforce that demands empowerment from their employers. Talent has reached new levels of mobility and workers know this....

The Singapore Parliament passed the Cybersecurity (Amendment) Bill (the Bill) on 7 May 2024, amending the Cybersecurity Act 2018 (the Act). The Act is Singapore’s legal framework for the supervision and maintenance of national cybersecurity by the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore (CSA), setting out measures to prevent, manage and respond to cybersecurity threats and incidents, and the Bill seeks...

Gartner predicts more than 70% of government agencies will use AI to enhance human administrative decision making by 2026. Machine learning, analytics and generative AI will mature over the next two years and combine into a suite of tools that will support improved government service delivery. Gartner VP analyst Todd Kimbriel says government CIOs must find new ways to meet citizen demands for mode...

Despite early apprehensions about an economic recovery in 2024, we continue to see continued investments in digital transformation initiatives by the financial services sector in Asia. We continue to see digital services rising on the back of maturing understanding and adoption of technologies like analytics, cloud and mobility. Targeted outcomes continue to be efficiencies, convenience and access...

The CIMA Foundation says “disaster don’t discriminate, but people do”. The journey to gender parity remains obstructed by a myriad of factors including culture, bias, misconceptions and attitudes. But if the Paris 2024 Olympics is any indication of the possibility, we may have hope that someday, there will be parity between the genders across the finance function, if not the rest of the enterprise...

The accelerated digitalisation of business processes arising from the pandemic of 2020-2022 has proven that humans are resilient, responsive and creative when the situation calls for it. In ASEAN, 8 out of 10 members are in some stage of implementing a national ID program .  How will these developments, on top of developments around identity security, and AI in security among other things. In reco...

A Gartner 2023 Gartner CIO and Technology Executive Survey revealed that even before ChatGPT, one-third of CIOs say their organization had already deployed artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, and 15% more believe they will deploy AI within the next year.  Recognising the high expectations CEOs and business unit leaders have on AI puts a heavier burden on the CIO to manage expectations and t...

PodChats for FutureCIO: Fast tracking the people side of doing business in Asia Finding and retaining talent poses significant challenges and opportunities in Asia and around the world. One of the main challenges is the increasing competition for skilled professionals in the global job market. As economies grow and industries evolve, the demand for highly qualified candidates often exceeds the ava...

The Internet of Things remains a top priority. Market research firm IoT Analytics says IoT remains a top-three corporate technology priority even AI has taken over as the top technology priority. In surveys from PWC , KPMG , and BCG , respondents ranked IoT second or third after AI in terms of investment prioritization for emerging technologies, with AI coming in first across the board. In the Asi...

In Asia, the importance of inclusion in enhancing customer experience cannot be overstated. With its diverse population comprising various ethnicities, cultures, languages, and traditions, creating an inclusive environment is crucial for businesses to effectively cater to their customers' needs and preferences.  By embracing diversity and fostering inclusion, companies can better understand t...

KPMG asserts that with all the focus around modernization and/or transformation over the last few years, there is growing recognition that perhaps employees are feeling exhausted. They’re facing one modernizing initiative after another—or multiple initiatives simultaneously—often with competing timelines and priorities. This is known as digital transformation fatigue, and it’s a growing trend as c...

IDC predicts that in 2024, 50% of APAC cities and states will pilot GenAI to improve efficacy in community outreach and customer service, procurement, staff recruitment and training, and software development. The latest IDC FutureScape report predicts that AI and automation technologies will remain central to tech investment initiatives.  According to Dr Lily Phan, Research Director, Intelligent A...

A GitHub report on the growth and impact of AI on software development, including claims pf a 55% faster coding when using an AI-assisted automation tool. GitClear published a separate report to determine how AI Assistants influence the quality of code being written. Just as important, as development teams start to include automation tools in the development cycle, how can they maintain control ov...

Mordor Intelligence estimates the Asia-Pacific data centre market at around 14.27 thousand MW in 2024, predicting it to reach 23.20 thousand MW by 2029. JLL projects continued increase in rank density particularly among hyperscalers in response the growing demand for computational power.  With sustainability and climate change high on the agenda for many businesses, a multi-prong challenge of data...

126 business emails (per person) go out daily or 124.5 billion work emails get sent and received every day. The Email Statistics Report of Radicati Group claims that customers are most likely interested in interacting with a brand from the email notifications they receive from brands instead of using email as an interpersonal communication tool, showing value in emails outside of the usual open an...

Artificial Intelligence continues to drive discussions across the enterprise. From the Board down to the workforce. C-suites are being asked to drive not just the discussion but strategies on how to best tap the technology before the competition does. Gartner warns that AI poses unique challenges for governance that must be directly addressed to mitigate risks and take advantage of opportunities....

From the greek word authentikos, authentication, the act of verifying an identity, continues to evolved. Depending on the context, authentication might involve validating a person’s identity through identity documents, verifying the authenticity of a website with a digital certificate or determining the age of an artefact by carbon dating or ensuring a product is genuine. For decades passwords hav...

It can be argued that business leaders and organisations face major shifts in the workplace, not the least of which are inflationary pressure on both employer and employee budgets, increased tension over return-to-office mandates, shifting legal and societal landscape concerning DEI initiatives, as well as the impact of client change. On the topic of sustainability, Gartner says in 2024 organizati...

The WEF Global Cybersecurity Outlook 2024 reveals a divide between those who are resilient and those who aren’t. Emerging technologies will only widen this gap. Vivek Gullapalli, global CISO for APAC at Check Point Software Technologies opines that in the digital world, most “everything is highly interconnected, with the seemingly singular exception of cyber security, which remains locked in isola...

A 2023 Deep Instinct report claims that the increased adoption of emerging technologies like generative AI is a cause for concern among cybersecurity professionals with 46% concerned that AI will increase their organisation’s vulnerability to attacks.  Stress levels are also increased among 55% of respondents to the study, with 86% of respondents who have experienced an increase in attacks over th...

Securing IoT in the enterprise is complex because of the varying of IoT devices and their diversity in form, function and purpose. While some IoT devices like smart devices may have some form of memory and computing, therefore operating system, others like sensors and telemetry modules merely capture data and pass this to other technologies in the workflow. It is this diversity of form, function a...