다면시장 (Multisided Markets)의 미로를 관리하기

  한때 실리콘밸리에서 유행을 주도했고, Facebook, Airbnb, Uber 와 같은 성공기업들을 이해하는 데 이론적 비즈니스모델에 대한 기반과 영감을 마련해 준 multisided platform 분야에 대해 초기 이론을 비교적 쉽게 이해하도록 씌여진 가벼운 글을 소개할 까 한다. 

  아래 소개한 essay를 집필한 David Sparks Evans 시카고대학교 법과대학원 교수는 하버드 비즈니스스쿨의 Andrei Hagiu 교수와 함께, 플랫폼 기반 비즈니스의 세계적인 권위자로 꼽힌다. 특히 (two-sided market)분야에 이론적 기초를 제공하고 2006년 Andrei Hagiu 교수와 공저로 유명한 Invisible engine: How Software Platforms Drive Innovation and Transform Industries, MT Press, 2006 를 집필했고, 2007년 Catalyst Code: The Strategies Behind the World's Most Dynamic Companies. Harvard Business School Press 를 출간했다.

  아래 내용은 David S. Evans 교수가 National Economics Research Associated 라는 경영컨설팅회사의 수석부사장으로 재직 당시인 2003년 가을 strategy+business 에 기고한 Managing the Maze of Multisided Market 이라는 제목의 essay 를 발췌 번역한 것이다. 비교적 친숙한 사례를 통해 무리없이 다면시장의 특성에 대해 이해하도록 기술되어있다. 원문은 여기를 통해 볼 수 있다.

다면시장의 미로를 관리하기

  히로모토 후쿠다는 2000년에 일본 오사카에서 새로운 종류의 데이트 클럽을 시작했다. 투바 카페에는 유리로 된 칸막이를 사이에 두고 남자와 여자가 서로 마주보며 앉는다. 여자를 만나보기를 원하는 남자는 웨이터에게 "사랑의 엽서"를 여자에게 전해주도록 요청한다. 후쿠다는 이러한 서비스가 이루어질 충분한 남자와 여자가 성원될 올바른 가격체계가 필요함을 알았다. 그래서 투바카페는 남자에게는 회원권 비용으로 100불을 그리고 방문 시마다 20불을 지불하게 하고 여성에게는 무료로 하였다,

  프랭크 맥나마라는 1950년에 다른 종류의 클럽을 시작했다. 그는 신용카드라는 것을 창안했다. 다이너스 클럽의 "회원"은 레스토랑에서 카드로 식비를 결재하고 카드 회사는 월말에 지불하였다. 히로모토 후쿠다씨와 같이 맥나마라는 손바닥도 마주쳐야 소리가 난다는 사실을 인식하였다. 충분한 카드소유자가 없으면, 상인들은 참여하지 않을 것이고, 충분한 상인들이 가입되어있지 않으면, 고객들은 카드를 가입하려 하지 않을 것이기 때문이다. 상인들은 데이트 클럽의 남자와 같은 것이고 카드소유자는 여자와 같다 그래서 맥나마라는 상인에게 요금을 부과했다. 아메리카 익스프레스 회사가 이 비용 모델을 몇 년 후에 채택해서 부를 쌓았다.

  뉴욕시장이자 비즈니스 정보 기업가인 마이클 블룸버그는 1982년에 블룸버그 프로페셔널 서비스를 출범할 때, 클럽이라고 명명하지 않았다 그러나 글로벌 데이타와 유력한 뉴스집단인 이 클럽은 히로모토 후쿠다나 프랭크 맥나마라와 동일한 개념으로 이해되기 시작했다. 다른 정보서비스와 같이 불름버그는 독점적 금융 데이터를 전자 네트워크를 통해 제공하였다. 그러나 다른 기업들과는 다르게, 불룸버그는 초기에 시스템이 증권거래부터 전자 투자설명회까지 이르는 방대한 집단의 제3자 서비스 제공을 고객과 연결하면 무척 가치가 있을 것을 인식하였다. 사용자들은 매달 수수료를(터미널당 1300불) 지불한다. 그러나 금융서비스 전문가들에게 인기 있는 서비스를 만들기위한 풍부한 컨텐츠를 유치하기 위해, 블룸버그는 왕왕 독립 컨텐츠 제공자들에게는 플랫폼에 억세스 비용을 거의 부과하지 않는다.

  다면 시장(multisided markets - 두 개 혹은 그 이상의 뚜렷이 다른 그러나 상호의존적인 그룹의 고객을 연결하는 시장)은 십 년간 우리 주위에 있어왔으나, 최신 정보 기술이 복잡한 시장을 조장하는데 보다 많은 기회를 창출함으로써 오늘날 급속히 증식하고 있다. 비즈니스에서 다면시장을 위한 "플랫폼"은 기술과 조직 기관에 따라 크게 다르지만, 모두 다음과 같은 3가지 특징을 공유한다:

n  개별 플랫폼은 두 개 혹은 그 이상의 뚜렷이 다른 고객 그룹을 제공한다. 예: 남자와 여자, 상인과 카드소유자, 금융서비스 사용자와 금융서비스 판매자.

n  각 고객그룹의 플랫폼 가치는 다른 상호의존적 그룹의 고객 수의 증가와 더불어 증가한다. 신용카드소지자는 근처의 모든 상점이 카드를 받아주길 바라고, 보다 많은 고객이 카드를 가져올 수록, 상점은 카드의 가치를 쳐준다.

n  플랫폼은 고객 그룹간에 상호작용을 할 수 있는 보다 우수한 방법을 제공해야 한다. 금융서비스 전문가들은 정보를 획득할 다른 대안이 많지만, 블룸버그는 거의 모든 가능한 금융 데이타 출처를 한자리에서 쇼핑하도록 제공한다.

표 1. 다면시장의 예

	고객	지불 주체
텔레비젼	시청자, 광고업자	광고업자
지불카드	보유자, 상인	대다수 상인
전화번호부	전화보유자, 상인	상인
컴퓨터 운영체제	컴퓨터 생태계참여자	컴퓨터 사용자
비디오게임 콘솔	사용자, 게임업자	사용자 업자 모두
웹 경매	구매자, 판매자	판매자

  IBM은 주전산기 컴퓨터를 위한 운영체제를 유지했지만, 마이크로소프트가 Window 운영체제로 어디에나 있는 흔한 플랫폼으로 만드는 노력은 적게 쏟았다. 환경이 플랫폼을 존재 가능하도록 한다는 사실이 앞으로도 플랫폼이 계속 존재한다는 것을 의미하지는 않는다. 게다가, 플랫폼이 만들어져도, 잠재 고객들은 서비스를 제공받을 다른 방법을 찾기 때문이다.

양쪽의 참여

충분한 카드소유자가 없으면 상인은 참여하지 않고, 충분한 상인들이 가입되어있지 않으면 카드소유자가 되기 싫어하는 이러한 닭이 먼저냐 달걀이 먼저냐 문제에 직면한 맥나마라와 그의 동료들은 맨하탄의 몇 백 명의 거주자들에게 카드를 배포하는 소규모로부터 시작했다. 레스토랑을 전전하며 고객이 카드로 지불하면 7퍼센트를 요구하였고 초기에 14곳의 음식점이 계약했다. 1951년 첫해에 300 상점과 4,000 명의 카드소유자를 보유하고 10년 후에, 150만 카드소유자와 15만 기관이 카드를 받게 되었다. 다이너스 클럽은 첫해부터 흑자를 기록하여 플랫폼 시장에서 작게 시작해서 키우는 것이 때로는 장점으로 작용함을 보여준다.

  1958년에 아메리칸 익스프레스가 시장에 참여하기로 결정했을 땐, 시장을 천천히 늘려가는 사치를 할 수가 없었다. 그래서 두 측면의 플랫폼을 현존하는 두 개의 소규모 카드 프로그램을, Gourmet 잡지가 운영하는 것과 같은,  끼워 맞추는 것을 통해서 구축했다. 아메리칸 익스프레스는 나중에 양 측면이 개입하도록 "주요인물(marquee)"전략을 따르는데, 이는 각 측면에서 매우 가치 있는 고객을 가입함으로써 다른 측면을 보다 끌어들이는 것을 뜻한다. 상인의 관점에서는, 주요인물(marquee) 고객은 가격에 민감하지 않고 소비가 많은 비즈니스 여행고객을 포함하고, 카드소유자 관점에서는, 상류층 상점의 네트워크에 속해있다는 것이 큰손이라는 지위를 의미하는 것이 되기 때문이다.

실험 과 진보

닭이 먼저냐 달걀이 먼저냐 하는 문제를 푸는 경험이나 수요를 균형 잡는 가격을 책정하는 것의 대체재는 없어 보인다. 따라서 후발진입자는 선구자로부터 주로 많이 배운다. 아메리칸 익스프레스는 경쟁사가 부과하는 것보다 높은 카드수수료와 낮은 상점수수료를 실험하기 전까지는 돈을 벌지 못했다

  혹은 최초진입자의 이점 역할을 고려해볼 수도 있겠다. 닷컴시절에는 가격을 낮춰 시장을 순식간에 점유하는 것이 성공의 공식으로 인식되기도 했다. 네트워크효과, 즉 개별사용자의 서비스 가치는 네트워크상의 전체 사용자가 증가할 수록 가치가 올라간다는 이론은 경쟁자들에게 잠재적 진입장벽으로 작용했다. 그러나 이러한 이론은 플랫폼 산업의 현실에서는 적용되기가 어렵다. 다이너스클럽은 카드계의 선두진입자였고 거대한 네트워크를 구축했다. 허지만 아메리칸 익스프레스가 이 선두진입자를 넘어뜨리는 것을 막지는 못했다. 최초의 웹 경매사이트도 eBay 가 아니었다.

  조그만 규모로 실험해보고 확장하는 것이 플랫폼 비즈니스가 큰 재앙의 손실을 막는 지름길이다. eBay 도 초기에는 Pez 캔디통을 사고 팔고자 하는 사용자들을 위해 경매사이트를 시작했다. 여기도 역시 판매자가 구매자대신 비용을 지불하는 올바른 가격구조를 구축하고 시장에 진출하기 전에 플랫폼 설계에 꼬여있는 부분을 작업했다. 시간이 지나면서, 다른 C2C 제품으로, B2C 로 그리고 결국 B2B로 확장되었다. eBay 의 브랜드 인지도와 전국 시장 접근 성을 이용하여 몇 개월 만에 eBay가 중고차 판매의 유력집단이 되었다.

  때로는 플랫폼이 복잡한 양상으로 교차되기도 한다. 한 플랫폼이 고객 그룹 A, B에 연결되고, 반면 다른 플랫폼이 고객 그룹 B와 C에 연결될 수 있다. 따라서 관련 플랫폼의 관리자들은 다른 플랫폼들이 고객 그룹 B를 어떻게 대우하는 가라는 관점에서 가격과 서비스를 책정해야만 한다.

  무료 무선 TV도 케이블 TV과의 사이에서 이와 비슷한 문제를 직면했다. Free TV 는 비교적 생산하기에 저렴한 컨텐츠를 시청자들에게 제공하고 광고업자들에게 비용을 청구하면서 매출을 벌어들였다. 이와는 반대로, 케이블 TV는 시청자들에게 광고에 노출되는 비중을 줄이면서 고급 컨텐츠를 제공하는 수신료를 통해 돈을 번다. 인터넷을 통해 비교적 양질의 컨텐츠를 제공하는 AOL 타임워너도 기존의 인터넷 제공업체들과 경쟁하는데 유사한 문제를 직면했다.

이제 세계로

전통적 시장에서는 적어도 경제적으로 자명한 이치는 보다 섬세한 분석을 위한 벤치마크나 출발점으로 기여했다. 이와는 반대로, 특히 새로운 시장의 다면 플랫폼은 주로 전략가들이 하얀 백지에서부터 계획을 시작하는 것이 필요하다. 다면시장의, 상호의존적인 고객그룹들과 일하기 위해, 회사들은 직접 비용은 가격전략에 별다른 지침이 되지 못함을 발견했다. 마찬가지로 조기 진입은 선두진입자 이점을 나타낼지 모르나, 혹은 단지 후발추종자에게 성공적 전략의 탐색을 단순화시켜주는 것인지 모른다. 고객그룹의 상호의존성이라는 것이 비즈니스 환경에서의 영향을 기대하기가 훨씬 더 어렵다는 점도 역시 고려해야 한다.

  근대기 다수의 위대한 비즈니스 왕국들- eBay, 아메리카 익스프레스, 마이크로소프트, 시스코등 - 은 다면플랫폼을 그들의 장점으로 작용하도록 만드는데 뛰어났기 때문에 이에 기반해서 번영했다. 데이트클럽에서 시작된 것이 이제 세계로 퍼져나가는 것이다.

**The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.

IBM, “사물인터넷”에 30억 달러 투자

미국시간으로 3월31일에 사물인터넷에 대한 IBM 의 투자 발표가 있었습니다. 아래는 그 주요 내용입니다.

각 산업 분야에서 IoT 데이터를 활용할 수 있는 클라우드 기반 개방형 플랫폼 개발 계획                   

IBM은 사물인터넷(IoT: Internet of Things) 비즈니스를 강화하기 위해 향후 4년 간 30억 달러를 투자한다고  미국시간으로 3월31일 밝혔다. 이를 위해 IBM은 IoT 신사업부를 설립하고, 데이터와 정보를 실시간으로 기업 경영에 접목시킬 수 있는 클라우드 기반 개방형 플랫폼 개발 계획도 함께 발표했다.

IBM은 산업에 특화된 새로운 클라우드 서비스와 개발자 툴을 바탕으로 IoT 및 기존 소스에서 나오는 방대한 양의 데이터를 한꺼번에 통합할 수 있는 전문 기술을 개발할 계획이다. 개방형 플랫폼 기반의 이 기술은 커넥티드 기기의 설계 및 제조 역량을 강화해 줄 뿐 아니라, 비즈니스 의사결정에 IoT 데이터를 활용하는 새로운 시스템을 제공할 수 있을 것으로 기대된다.

새로운 IBM IoT 클라우드 서비스로 비즈니스 통찰력 강화

IBM 추산에 따르면 스마트폰, 태블릿, 커넥티드 카, 가전 제품 등에서 생성되는 데이터의 90%는 분석되지도, 활용되지도 않고 있다. 데이터의 60%는 생성된 후 거의 즉시 그 가치를 상실하기 시작한다. 이 문제를 해결하기 위해 IBM은 아래와 같은 전략을 발표했다.

• 산업용 IBM IoT 클라우드 개방형 플랫폼(IBM IoT Cloud Open Platform for Industries): 이 플랫폼은 고객과 파트너 및 IBM이 특정 산업용 IoT 솔루션을 설계하고 제공하는 데 활용할 수 있는 새로운 분석 서비스이다. IBM은 보험사가 커넥티드 카 운전자 대상으로 새롭고 다양한 보험료 책정이 가능하고 맞춤 설계된 서비스를 제공할 수 있는 클라우드 기반 서비스를 발표할 예정이다.

• IBM 블루믹스 IoT 존(IBM Bluemix IoT Zone): 블루믹스 PaaS(Bluemix platform-as-a-service)의 일부로 제공되는 새로운 IoT 서비스로, 클라우드 기반의 IoT 앱 개발과 구축 환경에 IoT 데이터를 쉽게 통합할 수 있도록 지원할 것이다. 개발자들은 더 많은 실시간 데이터와 탑재된 분석 결과를 입력해 IoT 프로세스의 자동화와 최적화를 더욱 강화함으로써, 기업자산관리, 설비관리, 소프트웨어 엔지니어링 설계 툴과 같은 기존의 비즈니스 애플리케이션을 한층 향상시킬 수 있게 된다.

• IBM IoT 생태계: AT&T, ARM, 셈테크(Semtech), 웨더 컴퍼니(The Weather Company)와 같이 전 산업을 아우르는 IoT 생태계의 파트너 확장을 통해 IBM의 개방형 플랫폼 상에서 데이터 서비스와 솔루션의 안전하고 원활한 통합을 보장한다.

2천명 이상의 IBM 컨설턴트, 연구원 및 개발자 양성

IBM은 IoT 역량 강화를 위해 전세계적으로 매일 평균 100억 건 이상의 기상예보를 하고 있는 웨더 컴퍼니(The Weather Company)와 글로벌 제휴를 맺었다. 웨더 컴퍼니는 IoT와 클라우드 컴퓨팅을 통해 10만 여개의 기상 센서, 항공기, 수 백 만 대의 스마트폰, 건물, 차량 데이터 소스에서 추출한 기상 정보를 수집할 예정이다. 양 사는 날씨가 기업의 비즈니스에 미치는 영향을 분석하고 효과를 최적화하기 위한 체계적인 조치를 취할 수 있도록 지원하게 된다.

IBM의 사물인터넷 사업과 관련한 보다 자세한 정보는 www.ibm.com/IoT에서 확인할 수 있다.

***여기에 포스팅한 내용은 개인 차원의 것이며, IBM의 공식적인 입장, 전략, 의견을 반드시 대표하는 것은 아닙니다

Towards Customer Centric Retail Enterprise

Retail Strategy C-level Seminar at Seoul Grand Hyatt Hotel in October 8th.

  IBM Korea hold Retail Strategy Seminar in October 8th at Grand Hyatt Hotel, Seoul. It was an intriguing seminar from the points of timing and context. Recently, one of leading South Korea retail conglomerate chairman expressed his strong will on omnichannel transformation. IBM addressed this portion of session in the morning with client CEOs and IBM was invited to pitch "future of retail" and omnichannel.  Retail Strategy Seminar at Hyatt was evening seminar target to Korea Retail CxOs.

  
  Keynote speaker was Jill Puleri. She is the global leader for IBM’s Global Business Services retail consulting practice. She was recently named by Consulting Magazine as one of their Top 25 Consultants for her vision and strategy at IBM in the Retail Industry.

  Jill kicked off "future of retail" presentation by saying from the points of 4 growing influencing factors:

1) Consumer Expectations, 2) Future Customer Experience, 3) Disruption and disruptors, 4) Big data is now broader data and shared some data points such as 80% of all brands could disappear, 69% of US consumers order food online using mobile phone, and top two influences of purchases are friends posts / pinterest on social networks etc.

Future of Retail

  Then shared some video clip (which I've been deeply involved in). It actually developed to showcase the customer's journey on shopping experience in 2020. We intended to demonstrate the future millennial shopper's experience by showcasing sequence of event & shopping behavior.For example, from location based push service, to payment on smart watch, social based customer communication, turning social media to shopping, tablet based online shopping, real-time on/off line stock status checking, shopping at the physical store with digitized interactions, sales assistant Pad for customer analytic and shopping assistance on the spot, smart fitting room with cognitive computing 'Watson' including real-time sentiment analysis and assortment recommendations etc. Reaction was awesome.

Technology is blurring the boundary between stores and online

  What does 'blurring boundary' mean? Well, this means there's no online pure-play and brick and mortar exist any more. And physical stores will evolve into experience centers. Purchases will be ultimately made through online, from online site or via digital interactions at store. So finally, transparency of pricing, service levels and experiences across digital and physical channels will be getting more important than ever.

  What does this kind of leading player's innovation mean?

  It means they are leveraging social as a communication tool for millennial consumers and employees and creating real-time customer value using mobile as an enabler. It also implies the notion that they are providing a differentiated customer experience – anytime anywhere.

 Disruptors are succeeding and directly impacting traditional retailers.

  We are all observing emeging disruptors’ presence everyday. These are, #1, could be the one who sacrificed profits to be the online shopping reference, #2 investing in R&D particularly Amazon, #3, firstly broadest selection followed by
adding and dominates 1-2 categories annually, #4 simple strategy such as one click to buy, #5 strategy such as knows customers individually, #6 'all you can eat' loyalty schemes, and lastly but least, #6 disruptive offer such as same day delivery etc.

  

Underlying challenges in omnichannel transformation

  Lance Tyson, Sr. Managing Consultants in IBM Retail Center of Competency continued second session for omnichannel.  He articulated some insights actually IBM found from the study which IBM surveyed 30,554 consumers in 16 countries in 2013 to discover their opinions of omnichannel capabilities and the impact on choice. See below Key Findings.   Probably one of most significant different challenge in Korea would be the different price and assortment between online and offline, compare to US.

Korean customers intrinsically have the notion that online should be cheaper than offline and online is meant to be offer the more attractive promotions or benefits than offline. Meanwhile, US offer consistent price and experience across the online and offline. For example, US major retailers apply same pricing and assortment across channels with convenience to experience items while in-store. Another words, markdown avoidance is a top omnichannel capability in leading retailers.

  

  From the IBM survey, prioritization of customer's requirements of omnichannel varies by countries. Korean customers put the "track order status" as no.1 rank, while global average put the "pricing consistency across channels" as no 1. 

  So if we imagine the in-store experiences, try different size and color in the fitting room and return back or pick up at the store as free of charge - this could be obviously an advantage over online. But if item is not available, sales associates should able to order online with free of charge delivery. Many Korean retails seemed not have this kind of transparency and flexibility and it lead us to imply the underlying challenges in omnichannel.

Winning formula for Retail

 So in order to provide consistent and transparent experience across channels, retailers should think about below winning formulas:

1.      Develop relationship with your customers: The era of personalization vs paper ads for all

2.      From gut based to fact based decision making

3.      Product is hero: Creating differentiation with product

4.      The merchant mind set: Creating the WOW in store feel

5.      Play where she wants to play: Build world class omni channel

6.      The new health and wellness: Integrating Doctors, insurance companies and grocery stores.

In order to achieve this, possible key enablers or immediate recommendations would be;

     1. Probably starting point is to visualize agreed vision of customer experience that describes where/how to interact customers. So customer journey map could be a key enabler to agree the vision for customer experience across channels.

     2. Changes in MD and inventory planning. Inventory and mark down planning should be integrated across channels.

     3. Given the consideration of potential key issues in KPI such as, when online customer order claimed to in-store pick up or return, or reverse way, online order at store - in this case, there's issue embedded in terms of incentives for sales associates or revenue split between online and offline. We can resolve this kind of KPI issues by using shadow P&L as KPI management.

     4. Aligning SCM: One of leading US retailer integrates its SCM across channels/formats with allowing the ecosystem of suppliers to be more cost efficient. This company shared SCM data with suppliers for free, for suppliers to cut costs with better planning and inventory mgmt. This company also plans to combine sales data for specific suppliers with customer data, providing analytics service to those suppliers.

     5. Know your customer: Major US retailer adopted customer behavior analytics in the store. For example, IBM Presence Zone use wifi as meduim to analyze the customer behavior since RFID make a so much distraction if store is full of RFID signal congestions.

     6. Competitiveness of store: Macy's and David Jones attempted to make store as attractive place for shopping with service competitiveness. US Retailers are not only put every efforts to  analyze customer behavior and traffic to check conversion of foot traffic into sales, but also empowered sales associates with mobile to invigorate service competitiveness in store.

If you are interested in IBM Survey, please refer to below key findings from IBM IBV Retail Survey in 2013.

Some key findings from IBM Retail Survey.

     1. The development of online shopping in South Korea far surpasses global trends as such, 27% global vs 48% South Korea.

     2. When IBM Institution of Business Value surveyed the question "how much do you want to share your current location (GPS)?'", 19% of responded yes in 2012, whereas the number went up 36% in 2013.

     3. Percent of shoppers who showroomed for their last purchase - global 8.0% vs South Korea 12.3%. Showrooming defined as having visited a store before ultimately making the purchase online.

     4. Influencers of purchase behavior is concerned, friends posts / pins item purchased on social networks are the most influential on purchasing behavior in South Korea (56%), while China (85%) and Japan (41%).

     5. Priority of customer requirements on omni channel: Price consistency across channels (1), and in-store, locate out-of-stock item and get it shipped home (2), was ranked as 1 and 2 respectively in global average, while track order status (1), and locate item at in-stock location and get it shipped (2), was ranked as 1 and 2 respectively in South Korea.

     6. IBM defined the 4 customer categories based on degree of utilization of Social-Location-Mobile digital technology: Traditional, Transitioning, Tech Intrigued and Trailblazers. The Trailblazers want to do things themselves wherever, whenever; they need visibility and consistency. Survey result shows that China is the clear leader for SoLoMo adoption while South Korea and Japan consumers are waiting for a reason to adapt.

Epilog

  This kind of customer centric transformation has connotations of cultural and organizational challenges. Particularly in order to catch up unprecedented pace of customer's buying behavior, firm should be more nimble and more importantly, transparent and having mind-set put the consumer at the center of equations. Korea retail industry will experience the hard times to do this, but I think it will allow the firm to learn something to be a leader in these brave new world of competitions.

** The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.

IBM 유통산업 미래전략 CxO 세미나 -10월8일 남산 하얏트

한국IBM에서는 10월8일, 남산 하얏트호텔에서 "2014 유통산업 미래 전략" 세미나를 소수의 유통산업 임원들을 모시고 개최할 예정입니다. 본 세미나는 특히 유통산업의 미래는 어떤 모습을 갖게될까에 대하여 글로벌 IBM 유통산업 컨설팅 부사장이신 Jill Puleri 를 모시고 온오프라인 통합, 소비자의 참여확대, 새로운 경쟁자의 출현, 공급자의 영향력 확대 등 미래 유통 산업의 진화 방향을 짚어보고 이러한 진화가 가져올 파급효과와 유통 업체의 대응 전략에 대한 의견을 살펴보는 기회를 만들었습니다. 이어서 고객중심으로의 유통산업혁신 이라는 주제로 '옴니채널'로의 이행에 대해 IBM 유통산업 수석컨설턴트인 Lance Tyson 으로부터 옴니채널 운영으로의 이행을 위한 변화과정을 글로벌 선진 사례와 함께 소개받는 기회를 갖게 되실 것 같습니다.

특히 요번에 방한하는 IBM 유통산업 컨설팅 부사장 Jill Puleri 는 최근에 Consulting Magazine 으로부터 Top 25 컨설턴트로 등재된 바 있으며 IBM 산업 Academy 의 18명의 전문가 중 한 명으로 선정된 바 있습니다. Jill 은 또한 National Retail Federation 의 아주 활동적인 멤버이기도 합니다. 전세계에서 러브콜이 쇄도하는 유통산업에서 유명한 연사로 기회가 되시면 참석하시어 도움이 되시는 정보를 얻고 네트워킹도 하시는 기회를 갖으시기를 바랍니다.

Jill 의 그간 경험한 유통산업의 통찰력으로, 향후 미래는 brick and motar 와 digital 의 경계가 불분명해지면서, 고객과의 무한개입상에서 경험의 일관성과 Aha moment 를 어떻게 창출할지, 타 산업 및 공급자와의 새로운 경쟁은 어떻게 대처할 지 그리고 인지컴퓨텅에 의한 contextual shopping 이라는 과제는 어떻게 우리 앞에 나타날지에 대해 살펴볼 기회가 있을 것 같습니다.

본 행사는 초청을 기반으로 한 임원대상 세션입니다. 유통산업 임원분들중에 참석을 원하시는 분은 아래 연락처를 참조하시어 연락 주시면 감사하겠습니다.

※ 아젠다

기타 이 행사와 관련된 문의는: 

IBM 의 김호인과장 kimhi@kr.ibm.com (010-4995-8629) 이나 김정혜차장 junghyekim@kr.ibm.com (010-4995-8213) 으로 연락주시기 바랍니다.

감사합니다.

"Open Innovation leveraging IBM Watson" class in UC Berkeley

When Watson meets Open Innovation

  

  It was interesting to note that UC Berkeley opened undergraduate class titled "Open Innovation leveraging IBM Watson" at Hass Business school in UC Berkeley from Fall semester, this year. I came across this class during my web navigation of Henry Chesbrough's Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation. I thrilled to see this course and the thought occurred struck me that it is the symbolic example of Watson ecosystem and father of open innovation actually undertook the mission of raising future talents who will ultimately marry the Cognitive computing with open business model as T-shaped professionals.

  Those of you who are not familiar with open innovation, Open innovation is a term promoted by Henry Chesbrough, faculty director of the Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, in a book of the Open Innovation published in 2003. Wikipedia kindly illustrates open innovation as, "Open innovation is a paradigm that assumes that firms can and should use external ideas as well as internal ideas, and internal and external paths to market, as the firms look to advance their technology".

  It was particularly interest given my Ph.D research areas were centered around open innovation and open source business model and IBM Watson Ecosystem announcement also direct related to my business relationship with leading South Korea Electronic company for their future business model.  Watson, the name for the IBM supercomputer best known for crushing “Jeopardy!” contestants, is prepping its “cognitive computing” technology to be utilized by third-party developers for the first time via a Watson cloud service called the “Watson Ecosystem.”

  According to Haas Student Blog, IBM has selected UC Berkeley, among less than a dozen universities, to participate in IBM Watson’s cognitive computing course to be offered in Fall 2014. According to Spohrer, Director of IBM Global University Programs, Watson can be built for any discipline , whether it is for business discovery, financial advice, retail, or medicine. The class is an opportunity for innovative students to utilize their creativity and go beyond oneself to help people through the Watson computer. Spohrer hopes this kind of cognitive computing will allow more flexibility in communication to be incorporated in one’s daily life, versus the current form of programming which necessitates expertise in special or unique languages. The students will compete against six other top schools to win $100,000 to seed their venture. Most importantly, the group gets to own the IP they created.

How Watson can contribute to business?

 OK then, this collaboration between IBM Watson and UC Berkeley naturally lead us to ask the question why?... Why Berkeley Hass school open the class within center for corporation innovation in UC Berkeley? I may not portray the full picture here, but probably I can attempt to do some jigsaw puzzles... university is another locus of open innovation particularly when new paradigm of technology is emerged. Think about early 60s' IBM efforts on computer science discipline. IBM constructed beachhead in Columbia University for birth of Computer Science Discipline at that time, do you now can see the another Deja-vu?

  Soon after Watson demonstrated the capability of answering complex queries within 3 seconds from “Jeopardy!” contestants, IBM directly start to explore Healthcare diagnose application area such as disease diagnose from Smart Phone. Motivation here is, getting smarter with technology that analyzes and understands natural language content, it's going to open a door to having companies look at the potential. There's traditional  databases on one side, there's keyword search on the other, but right in this middle, in this sweet spot where people are struggling to get greater precision to get greater  breadth in answering information needs. Here's some potential uses for IBM's Cognitive Cloud services from Watson:

1. Watson the shopping companion: On a mobile device with location services on, Watson could track your current location and give you competitive rates for products you want across several outlets in your vicinity, and alert you if you’re about to pass a certain store that has what you’re looking for. In other words, if you’re in a shopping mall, and several stores have the item you want, Watson could automatically find the lowest available price for whatever you’re looking for (once you set your location parameters) and direct you there.

2. Watson the personalized contents aggregator: Watson could tap into news applications or aggregators like Flipboard or Zite and read aloud news bits its user is asking about, but Watson would hopefully be able to remember its user’s preferences and, over time, begin automatically pulling stories it knows the user will probably be interested in. For instance, if a user constantly asks Watson for news about weather and typhoons, Watson could scan the news constantly and recommend certain news stories related to science and climate change – anything relevant to the user’s interests.

3. Watson the nurse: If WebMD could integrate Watson into its symptom checker, assuming Watson could hold a conversation and remember prior details, users could tell Watson about all of their symptoms, and Watson could return lists of possible conditions and medical solutions, be it home cures or recommending a doctor visit. Furthermore, Watson could search deeper through WebMD to recommend certain drugs or home treatments, or even locate and contact a nearby pharmacy to go pick up medicine. 

4. Watson the contact center agent: Most of contact center agents devoted to follow the Q&A guidance computer screen, and reality is, they were often flustered to catch up exact prescript on time and even miss the question during the conversation. What if Watson provide the personalized self-service experience for clients by dynamically developing personal profiles from unstructured data almost real-time?

5. Watson the research discovery agent: What if all the research related information on the planet including global patent information and up-to-dated research information have loaded into Watson system through real-time searching and crawling? Would it be nice if Watson identify the rear studies and information sources while building a case for original research?

Why UC Berkeley?

  Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation( formerly Center for Open Innovation) in Hass School of Business was known for source of Open Innovation study. The Center houses the Open Innovation Program, the Berkeley Innovation Forum, a membership organization dedicated to sharing knowledge about innovation challenges. Prof. Henry Chesbrough is faculty director of this center and He is the first person to clearly define the new innovation strategy that is restructuring R&D worldwide—open innovation. His first book was Open Innovation in 2003 followed by Open Business Model, Open Innovation: Researching new paradigm (R&D), and Open Service Innovation.

Given Prof. Chesbrough's footprint in R&D, business model and service innovation from the context of open innovation, we can easily guess that students in Management of Technology track in Hass School may explore the way to create new business model based on Watson Cognitive Computing paradigm in conjunction with new user experiences and new service innovation more in open innovation and collaborative manner.

This course will let undergraduate students access to the Watson Developer Cloud to learn about the technical aspects of cognitive computing, including ingesting, building and training a corpus, and then in the second half of the semester, using that information to build a cognitive app and developing a business model as a precursor to taking their ideas to market. The students taking this course will be among the first to have hands-on access to the cutting-edge Watson technology, enabling them to develop innovative ideas to solve the most pressing problems of industry and society. Gartner Inc., a research firm predicts that 4.4 million IT jobs will be created to support Big Data by 2015.

Epilogue

 To me, this is interesting move to academia as well as IBM from the lens of open innovation. Watson Cognitive Computing paradigm itself probably seemed not able to flourish within IBM company boundary alone given the complexity and string necessity of cross discipline confluence between business model, use cases and different expertise in industry and IT skills.

  So this class is perceived as another type of data scientist course armed with enterpreneurship and business model innovation, so ultimately enabling them to develop innovative ideas to solve the most pressing problems of industry and society.

I wish all the best in success and great advancement of open innovation between IBM and UC Berkeley.

**The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.

Proliferation of IoT and its implication

Proliferation of Internet of Things - what does this really mean to us?

It was my pleasure and honor to present "IoT & its Business Development" to one of Korea major Chaebol's CEO Breakfast session in May. I felt awe when I saw the number of standing signboard at the entrance. It was 195th forum. Wow, 195 consecutive breakfast meeting with more than 50 CEOs together? Impressive.

Anyway, I kicked off by saying some examples unveiled during CES and MWC such as connected crockpot, toothbrush(?), Belkin's Wemo switch, wash machine, car etc and then, explained the traits of IoT communication protocol. I explained MQTT as one of publish-subscribe based messaging protocol example for use of IoT. MQTT is light-weight protocol to fit into Internet of Things that is designed for remote location and characterized as, small code foot print, limited network bandwidth, high velocity, low battery consumption and "do not get "lost" in the event of a system failure" etc,.

And then illustrated some use cases such as connected car, condition based maintenance, smart city demo - Geo-spatial streaming data based integrated operation control and connected troops etc.

Merging of physical and digital world

As 1 trillion devices in the world are expected to start dialogue with each other, or 2 billion internet of peoples, it naturally lead us to imply the next question, " OK, what does this really mean to us?". Although some of survey unveiled the fact that explosion of data is the area where most of C-level executives were under-prepared, paradoxically it also implies the opportunity that we can extract the insights from these data explosions.

Way to plug our hands into the digital world

One symbolic example of merging physical and digital world is Myo from Thalmic Labs based in Waterloo, Canada. The technology that makes Myo possible — electromyography (EMG), which doctors and scientists use to record electrical activity from muscles —  is something Thalmic Labs have been experimenting. Co-founder Lake and Matt Bailey worked on a wearable device that could help blind people navigate using sensors. 

Connected Thermostat as 'thing' of a smart home.

Another example is certainly Nest learning thermostat and protect smoke detector.
As of today, the Jawbone UP24 band will have a setting that turns on the Nest thermostat when it senses its wearer has woken up from a night’s sleep. Mercedes-Benz’s cars will be able to tell Nest when a driver is expected home, so it can set the temperature ahead of time. Smart lights made by LIFX can also be programmed to flash red when the Nest Protect detects smoke, or randomly turn off and on to make it look like someone is home when Nest’s thermostat is in “away” mode.




Reinforce the firm's competitiveness within incumbent business boundary.

As world is getting more instrumented, interconnected and intelligent, firm needs to think about the way to gain competitive advantage from existing business areas.
First, instrumented means, data is existed as form of digital as we observed from above Myo or Nest case. Physical human motion and temperature can be converted into digital data through instrumented.  We should examine whether we can obtain the digital data from major touch points, and if yes, then map of collection.

Second,  interconnect the existing internal data first, and then beyond internal structured data, such as external unstructured data, social, streaming etc, so need to define the area to interconnect. Why? Because these efforts would eventually help the firm to understand 360 degree of customer profiling so understand the preference.

Third, intelligent. Ultimate goal of 'instrumented' and 'interconnected' is for intelligence. We need to study many use cases to learn how optimized data analysis facilitate the supreme services so eventually gain firm's competitive advantages. For example, as soon as you recognize the customer's event at any touch point (Nest recognize car is approaching near to house - in this case), you can analyze customer's preference from internal or external big data, so you can activate the very personalized recommended next best action (Pop up cool bear Ad at Next screen) to his/her instruments (in this case Nest or perhaps car navigator?).

Make new market with IoT

Inspire new customer experience engagement model:
With digital delivery capabilities, firm can internalize and enhance the customer experiences of every touch points through pre-designed system of engagement model. And then, firm may seeking the new business from adjacent area. In case of Amazon, once they conquered the book area then moved to adjacent spaces, such as CDs, groceries. In this case, it is essential to understand the emerging new technologies such as Big Data, Social, Mobile, Cloud and IoT.

Examine the quest where innovation capability meets opportunity:
Diagnose overall organizational capability to the point where data can be augmented as major resources. Explore the area where firm can advance to new business model innovation from the combination of firm's core competencies and real-time predictable insights.

Epilogue

Explosion of data incurred by Internet of Thing is, not a threat. But this statement is probably only true to the firm who understand the implication of data explosion. People only see this as an opportunity when they can extract the insights from these data explosions. In order to this, overall organizational notion such as "data is firm's strategical major resources" is required. Also organizational obsession on customer experience is essential part of ingredient.

**The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.

Internet of Things (IoT) presentation to CIO executives meeting

IoT and CES 2014

I presented “Foresee the future of IT through the lens of CES 2014” to the one of executive session at Plaza Hotel, Seoul. The object was to share my perspective on future trends from the observation of CES 2014. It naturally progressed to the topic around IoT.

CES 2014 is famous consumer electronic show and it is somewhat meaningful because this exhibition has usually taken placed during early January so it is regarded as precursor to anticipate IT trend that will shape the future.

I kicked off by saying some noticeable solutions from the show. LG showed the washing machine that is connected to smart phone to chat, and MakerBot for 3D printer. But I highlighted the Belkin Wemo Switch.

When IFTTT meets Belkin Switch.

IFTTT stands for “If This Then That”. It is a service that enables users to connect different web applications (e.g., Facebook, Evernote, Weather, Dropbox, etc.) together through simple conditional statements known as "Recipes". For example, If ‘sunset’ then “turn on the living room ramp”. This logic can be applied to web applications. But Belkin augmented this way into HW switch. The WeMo Switch can be plugged into any home outlet, which can then be controlled from an iOS or Android smartphone running the WeMo App, via home WiFi or mobile phone network. So in other words, you can control Wemo physical switch by Wemo App which can be applied IFTTT logic, so you can simply turn on or off the switch by clicking the button on the SmartPhone.

Facebook Messenger

Then I introduced Facebook Messenger. Well, interestingly enough, very next day of my presentation, FB acquired WhatsApp and paid 19B$ - 2^nd biggest tech acquisition of all time. Anyway, When Facebook faced the situation that its application should be continued on the Smart Phone devices, they considered the performance the most. FB acquired group messaging company named Beluga in March 2011 and introduced Facebook Messenger in August same year. It has known that Beluga was based on MQTT communication protocol.

Why Facebook chose MQTT for its messenger?

Message Queue Telemetry Transport (MQTT) was originally developed from Hursley IBM Lab for the purpose of Telemetry communication protocol to monitor and gauge the telemetry object. Characteristics of telemetry is low power & bandwidth consumption, very limited memory, and server capability, very long lifespan etc…, interestingly this is similar traits of Smart Phone. Given the consideration of HTTP’s communication through polling, MQTT’s heartbeat is originated from the requirements of low bandwidth and CPU usage (publish/subscribe protocol is under 5% CPU usage) in telemetry. MQTT communication protocol is conducted by publishing and subscribing. Subscribers nominate which types of information they want to receive by subscribing to specific topics. From publisher’s point of view, they publish in the event and forget. Rest part of communication governed by so called “message broker”. Message broker take care of session establishment and deliver so when the telemetry communication disconnected, heartbeat just checking the availability of counterpart, if disconnected, nothing happen, and once connection has established, broker resend the signal. So simply put, MQTT is lightweight, guaranteed service quality, based on publish/subscribe message protocol. MQTT is Open Standard base. OASIS (Advanced Open Standards for Information Society) adopted MQTT which stemmed from sub project of Eclipse Open Source Integrated Development Environment. MQTT boasts 93X more throughput than HTTP, 12 times less power consumption in the event of publishing, 120 times less power consumption in subscribing and 8 times less bandwidth workload than HTTP protocol.  MQTT boasts 50 µs app to app network speed where as HTTP takes few second level.

MQTT’s Publish and Subscribe protocol

In the WebSphere MQ Publish/Subscribe model the only thing which connects publishing and subscribing applications is the topic or subject which the publisher associates with his information. Publishers and subscribers need only agree on the topic to become connected to one another. Each different piece of information has its own topic associated with it. Subscribers nominate which types of information they want to receive by subscribing to specific topics.

Publishers of information are unaware of subscribers to the extent that they may publish information even if there are no subscribing applications requiring it. Publishing and subscribing are completely dynamic processes. New subscribers and new publishers can be added to the system without disruption.

With respect to a given topic, or piece of information, all possible combinations of publishers/subscribers are possible, that is; information about each topic may be provided by a single or multiple publishing applications the information may be received and processed by one or more subscribing applications.

The number of publishers and subscribers connected by a single topic depends upon the type of information which is flowing between them. As we will see later, WebSphere MQ supports both state and event based information, or topics.

Substantial numbers of use cases are possible in IoT

I shared “connected car” example as first popular Internet of Things use case. By connecting the Infotainment, Telemetics and Smart Phone, car owner unlock the car and find car when he/she lost, and when vibration in left front detected, sends data to car company who schedules appointment with dealer and sends invite.  Another use case is, condition based maintenance. Think about the petroleum pipeline network such as 17,000 km pipeline network.., how can we monitor the breaches or abnormal situations? By using 30,000 pieces low power, low bandwidth battery based M2M sensors in storage, temperature, pressure, refineries, spill location and pumps, operation center can detect, predict and execute based on condition based maintenance.

M2M Smart City demo in Barcelona Mobile World Congress.

Impressive demo was “connected car” demo in MWC this year. Solution that were comprised of IBM Infosphere Stream (SW that can process the unstructured stream data almost real-time), worklight and m2m message appliance “MessageSight”, underscored the importance of real-time monitor and control of road traffic and emergency control.  If I make long story to short, we could control the messages among the vehicle running in the Barcelona road from the control center. For example, demo displayed the automobiles in Barcelona city and let’s suppose one hydrant has broken and certain road was flooded. In this case, control center can define the zone and published alarm signal to specific zone, then the cars who have equipped with MQTT agent could subscribe that message and send messages to the adjacent cars, so ultimately all the moving cars in the zone could sense this alarm. And one car damaged and this would publish the fatal signal so emergence rescue team has arrived within short period of time….

Implication: OK, then what all of these imply to us?

Report articulates that 18B$ IoT market is estimated by 2020 and 30B IoT devices in 2015. OK good, then what this IoT proliferation to be meant to all of us?  

Proliferation of IoT devices and huge amount of market opportunity around IoT is somewhat threats and at the time, opportunities to us. We may think about the two approaches; How and What.

From the point of ‘how’, it is calling for new operation model. Firstly, it requires new capability.. for example, capability to take care of the consistent relationship around every touch points in omni-channels and deliver enhanced digital customer experiences. Second, capability across total organization is needed to expand among different channels and processes, and at the same time, it is also true to optimize every element’s capabilities. Third, it requires also integrate every element of value deliveries and optimize total organization centered on client touch points and effectiveness/efficiency point of view.

From the point of ‘what, it is calling for new customer experience which could be essentially achieved through enhanced digital contents…, for example, firstly, enhance customer experience improvements through digital contents of product & services, information, insights and relationship that could be captured across omni-channel touch points. Second, expand physical product and services to digital contents for new revenue growth. Third, redefine the system towards customer value oriented digital front office system so ultimately deliver customer’s differentiated unique value through digital channels.

Epilogue

Proliferation of IoT devices and consequent abundant data information lead us to imply the causality of businesses. This internet of things proliferation itself uncover the different control equations, it means we are literally exposed by exploded data information surrounded us and it requires new operation model which embraces consolidated view of information collected from every touch points of our clients relationship. Data is data but firm need to reorient its approaches more customer value orientation. If we are able to figure out the individual clients’ profile and persona for example, we may able to more proactively offer the value proposition, or perhaps predict the next best action based on our understanding of 360 degree client’s profile which have acquired from every touch points of engagements.

So it naturally leads us to conclude that understanding the customer is important, particularly true under exploding information era. Customer journey on product and services consumption could be also collected from proliferated M2M or IoT information. It means if we do the right job in maintaining customer lifetime value through digital front office transformation, it promises customer’s lifetime value to us. Because customer advocacy and intimacy stems from experience lock-in could be a critical weapon to win in the market place. 

**The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.