It’s been well documented that the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated digital transformation initiatives. ZK Research data found that 74% of companies have moved digital initiatives up by at least one year. Most modernization projects tend to revolve around customer experience (CX), which makes sense, given CX is now the top brand differentiator.
Customer experience (CX) has become the overwhelming top initiative for business leaders. CX is now the top brand differentiator; those that deliver an excellent CX thrive, while those that do not eventually fail. It outweighs the price, product quality, and every other factor when customers choose a brand. Loyalty can be fleeting though. In 2021, 67% of millennials dropped a brand because of a single bad experience, per my research.
This week, Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) company, is holding its Atmosphere user event. After being virtual-only for the past two years, the conference has an in-person component due to the pandemic. For Aruba customers, Atmosphere has always been an important event because it’s the place to learn about the innovation the vendor is bringing to the network, particularly in Wi-Fi, where Aruba has been a technology leader since its days as an independent company.
In a surprise move, Hewlett Packard announced a definitive agreement to acquire Poly, a vendor of workplace collaboration solutions for $3.3B in cash, which is inclusive of about $1.6B in debt.
This marks the end of an era for Poly, formerly Polycom, which was one of the pioneers of videoconferencing. The current Poly company is a combination Polycom business and Plantronics, which acquired the video vendor in 2018. Later that year, Logitech attempted to purchase Poly, but the deal fell apart at the 11th hour.
After two years, the Enterprise Connect show returned to an in-person format in Orlando, Florida. Enterprise Connect is typically a show that communications vendors use to announce new products and features – and Amazon Web Services (AWS) did just that.