COVID-19 and Enterprise Tech: Assessing New Trends
COVID-19 has transformed industry and enterprise. Here are some of the trends we’re seeing, and how our portfolio at JOIN Capital is stepping up to meet new demands.
It’s been a challenging few months for everyone, but we’re finally getting a glimpse of the fruitful era beyond COVID-19. The virus that has swept our globe and affected every industry certainly isn’t gone, but as Europe phases out its travel restrictions, we are now free to begin navigating the new landscape that has emerged.
This means we’re now planning face-to-face meetings with our board members and founders. Taking these assured steps post-lockdown has been incredibly motivating.
We’re proud of how well our portfolio navigated through these unprecedented times. It’s a testament to our vision that began in 2016: to bring Europe’s industrial and enterprise sectors to the forefront, helping them grow powerfully and sustainably on a global scale through technologies such as machine learning and cloud computing. This is what we call the Neue Industry — and we’ve seen COVID-19 accelerate its expansion.
The global pandemic has forced organizations across Europe to adopt platforms, infrastructure and software that hold the key to economic growth and productivity. Whereas many companies may have reached for these solutions slowly and steadily over the next several years, COVID-19 has revealed that the time is now. Sectors whose digital transformation has been lagging are encountering the urgent need for technological solutions to solve pressing challenges.
JOIN Capital’s portfolio represents an essential core of these technologies and services. Our companies’ unique successes in the last several months show the viability of advanced, tech-driven solutions to build a strong Neue Industry in Europe.
Current trends in the Neue Industry
Here’s what we’re seeing happen in industrial and enterprise tech right now, in light of COVID-19:
- There is inherent accountability of data-driven products that ensures decisions are made as truthfully and transparently as possible.
- Data-driven firms are experiencing exponential growth by linking technologies together (e.g., machine learning, cloud computing).
- New digital measures are not interfering with existing operations.
- Digital transformation is a journey that shifts and evolves over several years, as opposed to one single action that sets it all in motion.
- Governments are offering unprecedented support for businesses suffering and adapting during COVID-19. The logic once reserved for environmental benefits is being applied broadly and generously to digital structural and procedural changes.
- Business owners feel like they’re playing a game with new rules and shrinking budgets as they figure out what to change and how to do it. This brings a pressing demand for smart, technical solutions.
Our portfolio companies have stepped up and evolved with novel solutions:
Wizzcad, Europe’s most advanced project collaboration software for construction teams, has developed a free health and safety app for the construction industry’s return to work. It guides companies in safely reopening their construction sites so that they can maintain continuity and progress.
Having developed a highly connected, data-driven platform for office engagement, Office App has pooled its resources and insights to deliver its Post-Covid19 guides for landlords and corporates. It covers everything from social distancing to building access control, with the goal of creating the safest environment for returning to work.
Valispace continues to harness the power of open innovation by offering engineers a collaborative platform for developing COVID-19 solutions. After setting up an internal COVID-19 task force, the company made its software available for free to those working on innovative solutions for the crisis.
From webinars to and how-to videos, to health and safety research and shared experiences, Proxyclick’s comprehensive toolkit for post-Covid19 building safety is supporting organizations around the world in their return to physical presence.
What will happen in the near future?
Our trajectories show several clear trends in the wake of COVID-19:
- It’s sink or swim for legacy firms when it comes to digital adoption. Before the year is over, an unfairly large number of businesses will succumb to the pressure of operating under social distancing restrictions. Their lack of data will cost them. It’s up to them to remedy this future roadblock.
- Neue Industry trends in digitization, like the future of work and the fourth industrial revolution, will accelerate rapidly.
JOIN’s portfolio is set to dominate the industrial landscape in Europe, as increasing numbers of firms undergo digital transformation.
Office App: Offices must be set up to accommodate, collaborate and facilitate work-from-home setups. In other words, operations are becoming more complex and software will become essential for managing all aspects of office life.
Datapred: Organizations are beginning to harness the power of increasing amounts of data in procurement. They will use emerging technologies and humans symbiotically, even in high-touch environments, to digitally enhance the procurement process.
Proxyclick: Office buildings will not only have to constantly monitor energy consumption, maintenance requests and security, but they will also have to manage the flow of people in and out. Traceability is a key requirement.
beWanted: Adoption of digitalization in recruitment processes is becoming the key differentiator to attract and retain the right talent. Reduced travel, timing and personal contact will enhance this further. Changing skill set requirements and curriculums will make low-data legacy processes obsolete.
Flexciton: Autonomous, AI-driven factories are becoming a reality. Production will no longer depend on humans to instruct machines.
WizzCAD: Digital data and BIM elasticity are transforming all pillars of business in the construction process, giving contractors, architects and engineers the ability to collaborate and develop multiple touchpoints from anywhere in the world, in real time, on one cloud-connected platform.
Valispace: In the future, hardware engineers will work and collaborate on projects in a similar way that software engineers have done for over a decade. Work will be distributed and connected through the cloud and supported by software, allowing remote collaboration on hardware projects.
German Bionic Systems: Logistics are assuming an ever-increasing important social role, especially after the surge in e-commerce from the pandemic. In order to meet growing demand, factory workers will have to maximize their own individual capabilities with functional support systems, such as active power suits.
Learn more about the rapidly evolving European industrial landscape by signing up for the JOIN Capital bi-weekly newsletter, The Neue Industry.
