Old Dogs Can Learn New Tricks: It’s never too late to transform yourself. Having been a system’s integrator many years ago, I found the transformations happening at Capgemni very inspiring. There was a period where many system’s integrators avoided the conversation about going to cloud and for good reason. Their business and revenue model was not shaped for the cloud. They were based for on-premise installations. Enter the cloud and everything changed. With the integration of IGATE and Capgemini, outstanding changes are definitely clear. Replacing McKinsey and Accenture in many digital transformation projects, they are looking to lead the digital transformation. Net new customers are over 200 and a 35% increase in the client base in North America. Though under NDA, the brands were very impressive.
What did Capgemini learn from IGATE? And I have to say I really appreciated all of the executives transparency and honesty in their process of becoming a digital transformation system’s integrator – including but not limited to Fernando Alvarez, Paul Hermelin, Srikanth Iyengar, Bill Ruh, Lanny Cohen, Tim Bridges, John Mullen, Dee Burger, Todd Rovak, Jean Pierre Petit, Frank Greverie, Doug Mills, Mathieu Colas and Andre Cichowlas. IGATE was known for the great client relationship capabilities. A client’s CIO had said, “I’ve never had a company pay more attention to my culture and my people and company that what we have experienced with IGATE.” IGATE is a new breed of company infusing it’s culture into Capgemini, with the key themes of speed, agility and imagination. And Capgemini vowed to learn from IGATE.
Capgemni’s Digital Business Model: It includes not only the “what” but the “how” of customer experience, including digital customer experience, digital organizational and people and digital operations. In terms of the “how”– what digital seems to mean are areas like social & mobile, data, IoT, cyber security and cloud. There was a large focus on cyber security, as more and more customers are putting their data in the cloud. There is a focus on digital innovation as well as a digital ecosystem of partners and start-ups in the mix. There key digital capabilities include: innovation, digital customer experience, digital manufacturing and insights and data.
Fahrenheit212 Innovation Strategy and Design Company: They believe that innovation can be inherently reliable and have spent the last decade designing the method, building the model, and assembling the minds to make innovation a predictable driver of growth for our clients’ businesses. They believe most great innovations don’t come from consultants—they come from entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial organizations. Entrepreneurs are driven by a powerful force that counter-balances their challenger mentality. Namely, they have skin in the game. They don’t obsess over the process of innovation; they care only about the outcomes. And it’s why they make a good addition to Capgemini.
Since their inception, Fahrenheit 212 has harnessed this entrepreneurial approach through a performance-based compensation model that aligns our risk and reward with that of our clients. They offer their clients the option of putting a significant portion of our potential compensation at risk, contingent on their solutions hitting pre-determined success milestones. This means their ideas can’t just be interesting; they actually have to deliver actual business results.
Digital Manufacturing Is Hot: The digital manufacturing value proposition includes a comprehensive enterprise offer of smart product and plants, Capgemni IP and an extended ecosystem of subject matter experts and highly skilled resources. With a 180,000 Capgemini employees, they are looking not only to re-skill some folks as well as hiring new people.
Cloud Is the New Normal: Their cloud value proposition is that cloud first is the new normal. Of their North American clients, 80% want their applications in the cloud in some way- some pure cloud, others a hybrid model.
Competitive Roadmap For Capgemini: Capgemini’s competitive roadmap is one of quality of service where they want to work with some of the most demanding clients on the most challenging projects with the most talented people in the world. Capgemini’s entry into the world of IoT, though under NDA, was very impressive and spot on. I look forward to see what comes of their partnerships and their vision.
@drnatalie petouhoff, VP and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Covering Customer Facing Applications, including the customer experience of IOT