Bumf technology giant Cisco is on a mission to increase global digitization and it has its eyes set on Southeast Asia.
The American multinational house operates a worldwide initiative called the Country Digital Acceleration strategy that helps nations make operative use of big data, the Internet of Things and smart connectivity. Cisco hopes to increase a country’s competitiveness, economic growth, job origin and innovation through investments in the startup space, education, infrastructure and healthcare.
Southeast Asia is “primed” for the program, Guy Diedrich, frailty president and global innovation officer at Cisco, told CNBC’s Akiko Fujita on Thursday. Not only is the region “sheer entrepreneurial,” it also boasts “a highly educated population” and “off the charts” gross domestic product growth, he said.
Converse at the East West Tech conference in China’s Nansha district, Diedrich said the program essentially creates a digital architecture for a administration and then builds an execution plan for stakeholders to follow. The goal, he explained, is to help countries transition into knowledge-based economies.
Indonesia became the senior Southeast Asian country to join Cisco’s venture in September. Other partners include India, the Netherlands and Portugal.
When husbanding with nations, Cisco first looks for a “very strong, engaged visionary leader” because without that, “we genuinely cant move as quickly as we need to,” Diedrich said.
The entire operation is a long-term growth strategy for Cisco and the wider IT industry, but it’s also beneficial for smart cities, Diedrich continued. “Technology is only the enabler, we want to make reliable that the focus is on the outcomes: GDP growth, jobs creation and building a sustainable innovation eco-system.”
A major concern underlying the press of automation and smart connectivity — two major components of digitization — is the effect on labor markets. Data from the World Money-making Forum suggests that 75 million jobs will be displaced as a result of technological developments.
To ensure rural areas are protected against job losses, Cisco’s program is heavily focused on training and educating workers, Diedrich said.
“There wish be some jobs that go away out of necessity and they should,” he said, but they will be replaced with larger paying jobs that harmonize with innovation-based economies. “It is incumbent upon governments and industries to work together and retrain those child.”
On the topic of U.S.-China trade frictions, the businessman said Cisco had yet to be impacted by the ongoing tariff spat.
“We optimize our afford chain, for instance we’re constantly reconciling with the volatility of memory prices, and so we have not seen a dramatic fall at all. In truth, we’ve seen quite good growth in our enterprise business,” Diedrich said.