Through a research period of four months, Eventful Conferences has conducted extensive interviews with 50+ chemical industry companies, and held two round-table events in key chemical industry locations – Philadelphia, PA and Houston, TX. The intention of the research is to summarize the most common and critical challenges that the industry must address – crucial to their success. These pain points have been identified by the industry during the round-tables and throughout the interviews. The Best Practices for Chemicals Conference will strive to address each challenge, pain point and trend by providing solution-oriented presentations, backed by specific evidence and packaged to provide the audience with clear takeaways on how to achieve similar results.
In this issue we will discuss the importance of digitizing the Chemicals Enterprise in order to pave the ground for sustainable growth. If you missed or would like to revisit the previous entries in our series, please follow the links below:
Strategic Imperatives for the Chemical Industry - Part 1: Mergers, Acquisitions & Divestitures
2. Digitizing the Chemicals Enterprise
In our personal lives, we expect to operate digitally – from music to pictures to videos, we do everything online. For seasoned travelers, we get plane tickets on our phones, we book hotels and rental cars, and rely on smart applications for traffic and directions. We pay bills online, we fill out forms and sign without ever printing anything. And of course our children only know one way to operate and have never used a phone book or an encyclopedia that was not fully digitized.
But in our workplaces, we don’t operate the same way; we still carry forms and clipboards, we do data input from the forms into computers manually, and we often rely on others to create additional data from these records manually. Spread-sheets still proliferate. As a result, we increase the propensity for errors and maintain staff for data entry that could be used elsewhere. Further, we miss really hitting the nail on the head with the customer expectation that digitization is a new norm and should be integrated into any forward-thinking business.
Chemical companies are understandably concerned about the future of digitization and the impacts on current and future business processes. Expectations are clearly changing across all businesses.
- What is the ROI or business value of digitization, and how do I capture that? How do I explain functional changes that don’t lead directly to profit?
- What’s the road map for digital solutions? How can I plan out my digitization strategy?
- What are some applications of IoT in real terms and how easily can I harness them?
- What are the security implications for digitization? What do I need to consider and how is confidential information particularly handled?
- How does digitization relate to mobility? If I go digital, do I also have to have a fully mobile workforce?
- How do I get my suppliers and customers on board with digitization? What happens if I’m fully digital and they are not?
- What is the impact on my workforce and technology needs?
To get answers to these and many more questions come and visit us at the Best Practices for Chemicals Conference, being held in Houston on April 4-6, 2017!
Are you ready for the Digital Revolution in the Chemical Industry? Please take the Survey Now and let us help you in establishing the right platform and road map for your transition!
