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“Customers are beginning to explore that more and we are using that framework in several industries to process data.”
As a cloud-first digital transformation business, Satalyst leverages Microsoft and open source technology to build, integrate and support digital business solutions.
Specialising in advanced data analytics, IoT, software development, system integration and cloud solutions, the Perth-based business has chalked up key digital customer wins across agriculture and insurance sectors.
“Going digital is about reducing time to value and rolling out situations in six to eight weeks instead of six to eight months,” Elliott explained. “Essentially, we want to have roll outs done progressively instead of doing it in one chunk so that companies are getting maximum value out of their investments.”
Through adopting a digital stance locally, Satalyst is also breathing new life into the mining sector in response to the industry’s desire to extract every market dollar now available.
“We’re starting to see a few green shoots over here, more so in the newer technology space such as machine learning and IoT,” Elliott said. “We’re doing more work in mining than we did during the boom because companies in this vertical are starting to look to machine learning to try and find ways to optimise their business more than they did in the past.
“They have a digital transformation agenda in trying to automate things in their businesses as much as possible.”
Yet for Elliott, a lack of digitally savvy specialists continues to hamper partners seeking to leverage new technologies across the state.
“That’s always going to be the case,” he acknowledged. “It’s always going to be hard to find people when you are a business that is forward thinking.”
In a direct address to local businesses, Elliott also advocated the usage of bots and automation to help drive internal and external innovation for organisations.
“There’s an awareness that things are moving fast, but not a lot of companies are able to execute on that need,” he said. “There needs to be a move into areas such as bots to manage customer interactions and automation.
“But moving an idea into a proof of concept and then reality isn’t as easy as it appears, which is where partners such as Satalyst come in.”
As digital technology drives some of the biggest changes in the present era, such change is significantly impacting consumers, workers, businesses and the broader economy.
Subsequently, digital disruption is bringing large-scale benefits to Australia, WA and the wider world, including increased living standards, higher workforce growth, improved efficiency for businesses and government agencies, alongside new opportunities for innovation.
The contribution of digital technologies to the Australian economy is forecast to be $139 billion by 2020, when it will equate to seven per cent of the country’s GDP.
According to Deloitte research, there has also been a boom in the growth of Australia’s ICT workforce in recent years, from around 600,000 workers in 2014 to more than 640,000 workers in 2016.
Furthermore, strong growth in the technology workforce is expected to continue, reaching 722,000 workers by 2022.
“The ongoing strong demand for ICT workers and skills is consistent with the significant role digital technologies will continue to play in driving Australia’s economic growth,” Deloitte partner John O’Mahony said.
“The increasing digitisation of Australian businesses’ operations across all sectors of the economy has resulted in greater integration between ICT functions and broader business operations.”
For example, 52 per cent of the current ICT workforce is employed outside ICT-related industries, in such areas as professional services, public administration and financial services.
Market conditions
Increased ICT workforces may help overcome traditional barriers around expertise and talent shortages, but despite the digital direction of travel becoming clearer, challenges in WA still remain.
With digital and cloud joined at the hip, the state’s dependency on migrating to the skies in a seamless manner threatens to be disrupted by a constant stumbling block forever hindering local organisations.
Because while the state understands the benefits of the cloud — backed by a cloud-first government policy — such appetite for adoption is restricted by the hit and miss nature of network providers across the state.
“We are such a remote city, most companies or customers that we sell and provide services to have bandwidth issues,” Cirrus Networks director Grahame Gilson said. “We’re limited by the network providers.
