Analyzing the Value of SAP CX for Industries

SAP Customer Experience (SAP CX) offers industry-specific solutions to various sectors' unique requirements and challenges. The following are reasons why specialization is essential for industries:

1. Tailored Solutions: SAP CX provides industry-specific solutions tailored to various industries and sectors' unique needs and processes unique needs and processes of various industries and sectors. These solutions incorporate industry best practices and standards, providing businesses with tools and features to address their sector-specific requirements.
2. Enhanced Customer Engagement: By offering specialized solutions, SAP CX enables businesses to better engage with their customers in relevant and impactful ways for their industry. This can include industry-specific marketing strategies, personalized customer experiences, and targeted sales approaches that resonate with customers' specific needs and behaviors specific needs and behaviors of customers within each industry.
3. Improved Operational Efficiency: Industry-specific SAP CX solutions can streamline business processes, improve operational efficiency, and support industry-specific compliance requirements. This can lead to smoother operations, reduced costs, and better adherence to industry regulations and standards.
4. Competitive Advantage: By leveraging industry-specific SAP CX solutions, businesses can gain a competitive advantage in their respective markets. The ability to offer specialized, industry-specific customer experiences can set businesses apart from competitors and enhance their position within the industry.

In summary, SAP CX specialization's importance for different industries lies in its ability to provide tailored solutions that enhance customer engagement, improve operational efficiency, and drive competitive advantage in specific sectors. This specialization enables businesses to effectively address their industries' unique challenges and opportunities within their industries, ultimately leading to improved business performance and customer satisfaction.

Choose one of the following industries - according to your territory and customer focus - and make sure you understand the market trends, customer challenges in the industry and how we can help customers overcome these challenges with our SAP and CX portfolio

The evolving landscape of the utility industry creates an urgent need for innovation to meet customer expectations and maintain profitability.

As utility companies navigate the challenges, they must adapt and innovate to sustain demand and achieve profitable growth. Your utility faces challenges that are common in the industry

1. Deregulation in the energy market means that customers now have a choice in where they get their power, leading to increased competition from brokers and wind and solar farms.
2. Decentralization refers to the shift in obtaining power from anywhere and everywhere. This includes sources such as solar parks, wind farms, the solar panel on the top of your house, and even the electric vehicle in your garage.
3. Decarbonization represents our response to global warming and the push to reduce our carbon footprint. We save energy and shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources.
4. Digitalization has transformed customer experiences by allowing them to access everything online, on any device, anywhere, and at any time. Smart devices such as thermostats, light bulbs, and appliances have revolutionized the way we consume energy.

We will delve into four significant CX areas impacting the utility industry and its trajectory.

First, we're observing intense disruption and competition from emerging technologies. Rapid advancements in energy efficiency, self-generation, and battery storage fundamentally shift traditional utility retail business models. The growth of third-party companies, including start-ups, presents a significant threat to these traditional models. This market upheaval underscores the need for utilities to innovate and adapt to maintain market relevance.

Second, the more prevalent issue of poor customer understanding must be resolved. The hurdles posed by personal data security regulations often result in a need for personal data security regulations that result in a need for deeper understanding of customer behavior. This bottleneck, in turn, hinders the development of strategies and capabilities to improve customer experience. Utility companies are facing challenges in collecting real-time customer-related information and leveraging these insights across different lines of business to improve customer experience and identify new business opportunities.

The third challenge that utilities face is the inability to meet evolving customer expectations. As the consumer industries grow, they are setting new benchmarks for customer experience that utility companies can no longer ignore. Customer care teams are now expected to cater to a wide range of customer needs and support an omnichannel approach to customer care. This approach ranges from traditional phone calls to self-service, mobile, AI chat-bots, and other digital channels.

Lastly, we see that customers often need more access to information. Customers appreciate being informed about planned outages, service disruptions, unexpected bill increases, or energy conservation tips. However, the current practices make keeping customers in the loop challenging to keep customers in the loop, which is essential to building trust and reducing frustration when unexpected situations arise.

These challenges are not just theoretical problems; they have real-world impacts on utility companies. The first two challenges, disruption from emerging technologies and poor understanding of customers, directly contribute to low customer satisfaction. The latter two, failing to meet customer expectations and limited information access, are primary reasons for low revenues from new retail business. By addressing these challenges head-on, utility companies can improve customer satisfaction and unlock new revenue streams.

What does it take to deliver successfully against these strategies? Beyond CX solutions, it takes a solid digital core (ERP) and other utilities-specific solutions - these must be integrated. It's quite complex, so many organizations fail to do it well.

• Build Customer Intimacy: Establish a strong foundation of trust and compliance while leveraging unified customer data to personalize engagement and gain valuable insights for agile decision-making.
• Stabilize and Secure Commodity Business: Ensure the stability and security of commodity business operations by implementing omnichannel services, empowering customers with self-service options, and optimizing field service management for efficient operations.
• Innovate and Grow with Utility Retail: Drive innovation and growth in the utility retail sector by implementing personalized marketing strategies, expanding product offerings, and leveraging digital sales to capture new revenue streams.
• Sustainability for Decarbonization: Foster sustainability and contribute to decarbonization efforts by empowering customers to become energy prosumers, supporting eMobility initiatives, and incorporating gamification techniques to promote green customer experiences.

Many Consumer Product (CP) companies are challenged by heavy disruption in the industry. For many executives in the industry, this often requires making tough decisions to achieve profitable growth. Some of the trends in the industry today showcase just how hard it is to achieve profitable growth. 

Consumer preferences: Consumer preferences are changing rapidly. In addition to a significant rise in channel-less commerce, economic factors such as an impending recession, inflation, and rising living costs result in consumers switching brands without hesitation. Channel-less commerce and economic factors such as an impending recession, inflation, and rising living costs result in consumers switching brands without hesitation. We've learned that 80% of consumers plan to change their spending habits.

Personalization: With all this said, consumer expectations are still very high. After all, social media's ability to personalize messages has become the norm, and consumers expect to get relevant, personalized information immediately instead of receiving a generic, mass message. 71% of today's consumers expect some level of personalization. They're not interested in a one-size-fits-all message or a one-size-fits-all product suite. 

Channel shifts: With recessionary fears, we're also seeing channel shifts. Marketplaces are taking a more significant share, particularly for the CP industry, with 70% of consumers viewing this channel as the most convenient and accessible way to access the brands and products that consumers have come to love. 

Market pressures: High costs and supply chain issues drive scrutiny of investments. Leading consumer product companies must address inefficiencies, lower the cost-to-serve, and allocate investments only with a proven investment return. This applies to trade promotion, product, or marketing spending.

Consumer Products Companies are under intense pressure to adapt to these industry changes, and this new world brings challenges that impact the success of any player in the industry. For instance:

• Need to have integrated omnichannel strategies to attract new customers: Integrating omnichannel strategies for seamless customer experiences is essential for attracting new customers. However, most consumer product companies still use single-channel strategies to track new customers. Still today most Consumer Product companies operate through single-channel strategies.
• Efficiently manage the introduction of new products: When introducing new products or gaining market share of existing ones, Consumer Products companies need to optimize their sales operations through better inventory management, real-time analytics, and integration of marketing, sales, and production data. Such efficiencies are, however, only possible data. Such efficiencies are, however, only likely to be achieved with new processes and tools.
• Launch new business models and promote sustainability: Leading consumer products companies are attracting new consumers by launching sustainability programs to differentiate themselves by launching sustainability programs. This requires them to manage end-to-end processes, which can create challenges in visibility across the entire value chain.

Consumer Products companies realize they must go beyond their traditional business models and rethink their current ones, compromising the overall customer experience they provide. 

How can CP companies successfully deliver against these strategies? The answer is a robust CX suite of solutions integrated with a solid digital core (ERP) and other CP industry solutions. Though it can be complex, an integrated technology stack can help you deliver your brand promise and provide a strong customer experience across all routes to market brand promise. It also provides a strong customer experience across all routes to market that goes beyond just emails.  Here is what it looks like for CP: 

Customer Centricity

Embrace customer-centricity in marketing by prioritizing customer needs, preferences, and experiences. Tailor campaigns, products, and interactions to create meaningful connections. This approach fosters loyalty, satisfaction, and long-term relationships, ultimately driving business success through a customer-focused strategy.

Channel-Less Commerce

Digital commerce is a key aspect for CP in reaching consumers directly through marketplaces or through e-retailers. Key solution capabilities allow CP companies to allow B2C and B2B customers to self-survey through marketplaces or e-retailers. Key solution capabilities allow CP companies to allow B2C and B2B customers to self-serve on their preferred digital channels (owned commerce websites, marketplaces, social media, etc.), manage orders across all of them, and understand how to optimize profit with returns management.

Sales and Service Excellence

Retail sales are a majority source of revenue for CP companies, and having a seamless way to work with buyers is critical. With our sales excellence approach, CP companies can create an easy, self-service way for retailers to get the inventory they need, request the service required, and more. In addition, integrated with our revenue growth management solution, CP companies can get real-time insights into account planning, promotions planned, agreed terms, etc. Finally, auditing and Retail execution (REX) have always been challenging. 

Sustainability and Reuse

Consumers consistently buy with sustainability in mind, and CP companies can capitalize on this. Critical solutions include capabilities for re-commerce to reduce land waste, remanufacturing to recycle used products, tracing the carbon footprint of how products are made, and delivering sustainability in mind, and CP companies can lean into this. Critical solutions include capabilities for re-commerce to reduce land waste, remanufacturing to recycle used products, tracing the carbon footprint of how products are made, and delivering on responsible design and production promises. 

In 2024 and 2025, the high-tech industry may struggle with several challenges that significantly impact customer experience, planning, revenue, and brand loyalty.

1. Supply Chain Disruptions and Component Shortages: Supply chain disruptions, mainly due to geopolitical tensions, natural disasters, or unexpected events, can lead to component shortages. This directly affects a company's ability to deliver products on time, impacting customer satisfaction and experience. Delays in product launches or fulfilling customer orders can erode brand loyalty and revenue. Companies might need to diversify suppliers, invest in alternative technologies, or adopt agile manufacturing strategies to persuade suppliers to invest in alternative technology strategies.
2. Competition & market dynamics: High-tech firms face challenges in keeping pace with rapid technological advancements and evolving customer preferences, requiring them to innovate to stay competitive. Additionally, navigating intense competition and disruptive newcomers demands strategic agility and a deep understanding of market dynamics to maintain market relevance and growth.
3. Everything-as-a-service: "XaaS" refers to a model where businesses offer various services rather than physical products, providing solutions on-demand through subscription-based or pay-per-use structures. In the high-tech industry, companies adopt everything-as-a-service to offer software, platforms, infrastructure, and even complete business processes, enabling more flexible, scalable, and cost-effective solutions. This shift allows companies to meet evolving customer needs, provide continuous updates and support, and pivot swiftly in response to market changes, fostering innovation and enhancing customer experiences.
4. Customer centricity: Companies in the Customer Experience space grapple with the challenge of genuinely embedding customer centricity into their organizational culture and processes, often facing resistance to change and siloed departments hindering seamless customer interactions. Overcoming these hurdles requires a holistic approach, emphasizing alignment across all levels of the organization and a relentless focus on understanding and meeting customer needs.

We identify four significant CX areas that are currently impacting the high-tech industry and its trajectory.

• Changes in Customer Consumption Preferences: High-tech companies face the challenge of continuously evolving customer preferences. Rapid shifts in technology, design, usability, and functionality demand agility in product development and market responsiveness. Balancing innovation with meeting these dynamic preferences is crucial to maintaining market relevance and customer satisfaction.
• Achieving Business Resilience: Business resilience is a critical challenge, especially in a volatile tech landscape. It involves preparing for and adapting to disruptions such as supply chain interruptions, geopolitical issues, and global economic shifts. Creating robust contingency plans, diversifying suppliers, and implementing flexible operational strategies are key to ensuring continuity and mitigating risks.
• Unlocking the Power of AI: While AI holds immense potential, leveraging its power effectively remains a challenge. Companies need to address issues related to data quality, privacy, bias, and ethical considerations when implementing AI solutions. Additionally, integrating AI seamlessly into existing systems and workflows while upskilling employees to work alongside AI technologies presents a significant challenge.
• Cross-Industry Convergence: With industries increasingly intertwining through technology, high-tech companies face challenges in navigating these intersections. Collaboration between sectors like healthcare, finance, automotive, and more requires understanding diverse regulatory frameworks, different business cultures, and technological interoperability. Finding common ground and harnessing synergies across industries can be complex yet rewarding.

Tackling these challenges demands a blend of adaptability, innovation, strategic planning, and a customer-centric approach. High-tech companies that can effectively address these challenges stand poised to thrive in an ever-evolving market landscape.

SAP CX links seamlessly across the front office with behavioral data - including interactions, sentiment, churn risk product recommendations, demographics, and sentiment; from marketing, sales, and service. 

Meet your customer in the moment and deliver the right experience.

Link this with the back office - take the right action in S/4.

We have four core areas that deliver specific use cases across the CX portfolio for the high-tech industry.

• Onboard partners with seamless identity and access management
• Adopt digital customer experiences
• Achieve aftersales service excellence
• Pivot to new business models

We have listed some of the functions in more detail in the following image.

Some trends in the Wholesale Distribution industry today showcase how hard it is to achieve profitable growth. As a central link within the economy and supply chain, wholesale distributors act behind the scenes to source and distribute goods to customers worldwide. Due to the challenges of previous years, wholesale distributors have been challenged with unpredictable demand, increased strain on customer relationships, supply chain disruptions, and an intense need to safeguard the workforce:

• Increased competition: the wholesale distribution industry faces increased competition from suppliers, adjacent industry players, and marketplaces 
• Volatile supply chain: the need to anticipate future disruptions has shifted distributors' focus on forward and reverse logistics. They're mainly focused on demand, inventory, and supply planning processes
• Regulatory requirements: increasing regulatory requirements are adding complexity for wholesale distributors, specifically in the areas of customer protection, circular economy trends, national mandates, and product traceability
• Talent shortage: with talent putting an increased focus on working for companies with a purpose and a high brand value, distributors and other B2B industries are struggling to attract the talent required

One thing is clear from these trends - agility is key for success in today's wholesale distribution industry. With technology playing a crucial role for market leaders, distributors mu make continuous innovation an inherent part of their operating model.

Wholesale distributors are under intense pressure to adapt to these industry changes. This new World brings some challenges that impact the success of any player in the industry among them, the typical challenges are:

• Intensification of B2B commerce and marketplace

  Due to disintermediation and retail giants like Amazon entering the B2B market, distributors are being pushed to find new revenue sources in value-added services - such as product consulting and kitting.

• Personalized B2B customer experiences

  B2B customers demand a modern, personalized e-commerce experience with a broad range of products and services. However, this is usually prevented by the inability to manage disparate data sources generated by siloed applications.

• Collaborative wholesale distribution networks

  To differentiate, top distributors are acting as trusted partners to their customers. They are building innovative marketplaces that allow them to win share-of-wallet and ensure "old-fashioned wholesalers" are less relevant in the competitive arena.

Wholesale Distributors realize their need to go beyond their traditional business models to overcome the inconsistencies they currently provide from a customer experience perspective.

How can wholesale distributors successfully deliver against these strategies? The answer is a robust CX suite of solutions integrated with a robust digital core (ERP) and other wholesale distribution industry solutions. Though it can be quite complex, we know that an integrated technology stack can help you deliver on your promise and provide a strong customer experience across your lead-to-cash processes. Here is what it looks like for Wholesale Distribution:

1. Transform with Sales and Service Excellence: achieving account engagement at scale is facilitated by implementing intelligent sales strategies and enhanced by intelligent customer service, ensuring comprehensive and efficient client interactions.
2. Enable Customer Self-Service Portals: the seamless integration of a unified customer profile, B2B marketing strategies, self-service ordering options, intricate quoting and pricing mechanisms, and efficient assisted service capabilities enhances overall operational effectiveness
3. Innovate with New Business Models: businesses are evolving by offering unique services or bundled products with value-added services, transitioning towards a model focused on service and outcome-based solutions, and expanding their reach by providing products and services through their proprietary marketplace
4. Sell efficiently through Internal Sales Representatives & Branches

Your organization faces challenges that are common in the industry. We could spend days discussing, and you probably know more about them than we do, but they include the following:

Disruptive Technologies: Digitalization is reshaping the mill products industry, introducing new players, business models, and customer expectations. Customers now demand seamless, B2C-like experiences across all channels. Adapting to these changes is crucial for staying competitive.

Energy Transition & Market Volatility: The volatile pricing of energy and commodities can significantly impact a company's profitability. Implementing effective pricing strategies and optimizing energy consumption are essential for mitigating these challenges.

Supply Chain Disruption: Supplier disruptions can disrupt manufacturing and logistics in our interconnected global economy disruptions can disrupt manufacturing and logistics, affecting our ability to meet customer expectations. Building robust business networks and fostering customer collaboration are vital strategies for business continuity.

Sustainable Manufacturing: The mill products industry is shifting towards sustainability, demanding transparency and collaboration throughout the supply chain. Embracing sustainable practices is not just a trend but a necessity to meet evolving customer and regulatory expectations.

Let's discuss some of the typical challenges that companies in the mill products industry face. These challenges have a significant impact on their operations and overall business performance.

The first challenge we will address is sustainability and environmental regulations. As you may be aware, there is an increasing focus on environmental sustainability, and companies in the mill products industry are not exempt from this. They are required to comply with stringent environmental regulations, manage waste effectively, reduce carbon emissions, and source raw materials sustainably. These requirements can be quite challenging to meet, and failure to do so can result in significant penalties and reputational damage.

The second challenge is the fluctuating prices of commodity raw materials. Energy prices, in particular, have been skyrocketing, leading to volatility in commodity prices such as metals or pulp. This volatility directly impacts the profitability of mill products companies. Managing these price and margin fluctuations is a constant challenge, requiring effective strategies and tools to mitigate the risks involved.

Moving on to the third challenge, we find that the digital customer experience in the mill products industry is inconsistent. While traditional channels may be well-established, the B2B customer experience via digital platforms is often limited and inconsistent. This lack of digital maturity slows down customer adoption, decreases satisfaction, and hampers overall efficiency for both the company and its customers.

Lastly, we have the challenge of supply and demand chain disruption. In many mill products companies, data management, pipeline management, quote management, forecasting, and reporting are supported by disconnected tools and systems. This lack of integration leads to difficulties in providing accurate demand coverage, resulting in inefficiencies and missed opportunities.

As a result of these challenges, mill products enterprises face two significant business issues. The first is disconnected business operations, which stems from the sustainability and commodity price challenges. When operations are not aligned and integrated, it becomes difficult to achieve optimal performance and profitability. The second issue is that customer demand is not adequately attended to, which is a direct consequence of the inconsistent digital customer experience and the supply and demand chain disruption. Failing to meet customer demand can lead to lost sales, dissatisfied customers, and ultimately, a decline in market share.

How SAP Customer Experience solutions come together with S4, BTP and Partners can help mill products enterprise. We have identified several key use cases that can greatly benefit your organization. Let's dive in.

Deliver Sales Excellence. We understand the importance of empowering your sales organization with the right tools and insights to increase productivity. With our solution, you can streamline your lead-to-cash process, ensuring a harmonized flow from initial engagement to closing the deal. Our industrial marketing capabilities will help you engage with your B2B customers effectively, while intelligent sales features will provide your sales team with the necessary insights to make informed decisions. Furthermore, our dynamic pricing and configurable product solutions will enhance efficiency and deliver an engaging experience for your customers.

Adopt Digital Customer Experience. In today's digital age, it is crucial to maximize customer lifetime value, attract new customer segments, and optimize costs. Our solution enables you to achieve this by leveraging digital channels effectively. With a unified customer profile, you can provide personalized experiences across all touchpoints. Direct digital sales options allow you to reach customers directly, while self-service portals empower your customers to find information and resolve issues on their own. Additionally, our omnichannel customer service capabilities ensure a seamless experience across all channels.

Pivot to New Business Models. To stay competitive, it is essential to explore innovative offerings and sales approaches. Our solution enables you to expand your market reach and develop new business models. Selling through marketplaces opens up new opportunities, while outcome- and subscription-based services allow you to provide value-added offerings. You can also enhance customer loyalty by offering bundles and value-added services. Furthermore, our solution ensures supply chain transparency and traceability, enabling you to meet customer demands and build trust.

Develop Sustainable Manufacturing. In today's world, sustainability is a key differentiator. Our solution helps you create a safe, attractive, and purpose-driven business that attracts new customer segments and sets you apart from the competition. By launching new business models and sales channels, you can capture value from eco-conscious customers. Our solution enables you to take control of sustainability efforts, ensuring compliance with regulations and enabling a circular economy.

Key global trends affecting the industrial manufacturing industry:

• It is widely known that customer expectations are rising, and many in the industry are already adapting by personalizing their offerings and prioritizing the best interests of their customers' customers.
• Create a resilient supply chain. This involves localizing supply networks and implementing digital solutions.
• Due to heightened customer expectations, manufacturers must be more innovative and explore emerging markets and business models, such as bundling products with services or providing comprehensive solutions.
• There is a growing emphasis on environmental regulations, which require companies to provide transparency about their sustainable practices and compliance with government regulations.

Industrial Manufacturers face several challenges:

• Operating their business with disparate and fragmented systems. Fragmented systems result in isolated data silos, where information is stored separately in non-integrated databases or software applications. This makes it difficult to access and analyze data across the organization, impeding informed decision-making. Real-time visibility into the entire manufacturing process can be compromised in such an environment, leading to delays in identifying and resolving issues, ultimately affecting operational performance.
• The convergence of different industries further complicates matters, as managing and maintaining disparate systems becomes complex and resource-intensive. This complexity hampers the adoption of new technologies and limits the organization's ability to adapt to changing market conditions. Sustaining and upgrading these systems over time incurs higher costs, including expenses related to software licenses, maintenance, training, and integration efforts.
• For industrial manufacturers to remain competitive and adapt to the evolving market landscape, navigating the digital learning curve is crucial. Effectively mastering digital skills enables manufacturers to enhance their competitiveness, boost operational efficiency, and respond better to market demands. Continuous investment in skills development and technology adoption is vital for long-term success in the digital era. By strategically leveraging digital technologies, manufacturers can optimize their operations, enhance customer engagement, and establish a strong presence in new and diverse markets, including emerging markets and adjacent product categories.

How industrial manufacturers can benefit from the integration of SAP Customer Experience solutions with S4, BTP, and Partners. We have identified several important use cases that can greatly impact your organization. Let's take a closer look.

1. Achieve sales excellence: We recognize the significance of empowering your sales team with the right tools and insights to boost productivity. With our solution, you can streamline the entire lead-to-cash process, ensuring a smooth flow from initial engagement to closing deals. Our industrial marketing capabilities will help you effectively engage with your B2B customers, while intelligent sales features provide your team with valuable insights for informed decision-making. Additionally, our dynamic pricing and customizable product solutions enhance efficiency and deliver an engaging customer experience.
2. Embrace digital customer experience: In today's digital era, it is crucial to maximize customer lifetime value, attract new customer segments, and optimize costs. Our solution enables you to achieve these goals by effectively utilizing digital channels. Through a unified customer profile, you can provide personalized experiences across all touchpoints. Direct digital sales options allow you to reach customers directly, while self-service portals empower your customers to find information and resolve issues independently. Furthermore, our omnichannel customer service capabilities ensure a seamless experience across all channels.
3. Enhance aftersales value: Improving loyalty, customer satisfaction, and profitability in service is a crucial aspect to consider. Our solution focuses on providing operational excellence and driving aftermarket parts and services revenues.
4. Explore new business models: To stay competitive, it is essential to explore innovative offerings and sales approaches. Our solution enables you to expand your market reach and develop new business models. Selling through marketplaces opens new opportunities, while outcome- and subscription-based services allow you to provide value-added offerings. You can also enhance customer loyalty by offering bundles and value-added services. Furthermore, our solution ensures supply chain transparency and traceability, enabling you to meet customer demands and build trust.

Ubiquitous access to information has shifted power from the retailer to the consumer. This poses new challenges, or opportunities, for retailers. Some challenges are the following:

• Consumers are demanding new levels of value. with so much information at the customers' fingertips, they expect nothing less than the best price, instant delivery, and seamless experiences. Great brands have been raising the bar for years and now consumers have come to expect it everywhere.
• There are new, disruptive market entrants. New digital-first competitors and innovative business models are continuing to emerge. Retailers must embrace disruption and vertical integration as the traditional retail landscape is being reshaped.
• There is a sustainability paradigm shift - The retail industry is under scrutiny from both consumers and regulators - retail companies are a major contributor to carbon emissions, which also puts them in a powerful position to make changes that drive sustainability across their supply base. Leaders are thinking about Environmental Social Governance not as a problem but as a solution to cleaner, more efficient and less wasteful practices that safeguard the license to operate of their enterprise. (source of stat: SAP insights "Sustainability's role in business performance")
• And finally, purpose-driven retail - the next generation of consumers is looking for brands that align with their values and are willing to "walk the talk". Commitment to a purpose has become as important as a brand's digital experience. The future of retail is about thoughtful curation of products and brands that align with their mission and provide for a trusted engagement.

The impact is very clear - Retailers can't stand still or stay where they are. Even moving along at an industry pace will not allow them to grow their business as disruptors are already eating away the market share of their traditional business. This has increased pressure on retailers and brands to invest in innovative business models and new ways of creating value for their ecosystem. They need to constantly think about how they can deliver new experiences to capture the hearts and minds of shoppers and consumers with Instant delivery and gratification, personalized communication and offerings at scale, and a digital experience throughout every aspect of their business to open new opportunities to serve their customers better. 

To overcome challenges and accomplish those things just mentioned, we see that many of our retail customers are focusing on some version of these 5 strategic priorities or strategies for success- often in different orders based on their sub-sector, market position, and key differentiators. These Strategic Priorities are:

• Being customer-centric across the value chain: This is about putting the customer at the center of all decisions and providing omnichannel interactions with a curated assortment that does not leave customers overwhelmed with choices. 
• Serving the "segment of one": Here, you need to make your customers feel like they are the only ones. Personalize with purpose, and differentiate through value-added services, are the only ones. Personalize with purpose, differentiate through value-added services, and use digital capabilities to meet the unique needs and preferences of your customers at scale.
• Implement digital supply chains: A digital supply chain enables a circular supply chain from the suppliers to the consumers' homes and back. It is also about creating supply chains that minimize waste and keep products in use as long as in use as possible.
• Redefine stores: Make them places that underline your value proposition to the consumer and provide a unique shopping experience. Empower your store associates and managers to personalize each customer's value proposition to the consumer and provide a unique shopping experience. Empower your store associates and managers to personalize the trip for each customer and connect the digital and physical spaces to fulfill any customer request.
• New business models: Finally, to create new business models, you need to leverage platform scale and ecosystems to support integrated vertical business models for efficient consumer satisfaction models - here you need to leverage platform scale and ecosystems to support an integrated vertical business models for efficient satisfaction of your consumer. You can also create sustainable outcomes and higher brand loyalty through the expansion of service offerings and continuous engagement with your consumers. 

Again, these are the five strategic priorities we see across the industry, but their priority and breadth vary from retailer to retailer.

What does it take to successfully deliver against these strategies? Beyond CX solutions, it takes a strong digital core (ERP) and other retail-specific solutions-and these all must be integrated. It's quite complex, and that's why, as we saw in an earlier slide, only 10% of customers have a strong digital core (ERP) and other retail-specific solutions - and these all must be integrated. It's quite complex, and that's why, as we saw in an earlier slide, only 10% of customer strongly feel that most brands deliver a good experience.  

Omnichannel Retail Experiences. Creating a seamless omnichannel experience requires a holistic approach. Key solution capabilities include establishing an omnichannel profile, enabling personalized engagement, optimizing merchandise and assortment planning, facilitating omnichannel shopping, and implementing effective order capture and orchestration. These capabilities empower retailers to deliver consistent, personalized experiences across channels, enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Personalized Marketing & Promotions. Personalization is paramount in capturing customer engagement. Key solution capabilities encompass executing personalized engagement campaigns, implementing omnichannel promotions, and utilizing dynamic pricing strategies. By leveraging these capabilities, retailers can deliver tailored marketing content, targeted promotions, and personalized pricing, thereby captivating customers and driving higher conversions.

Seamless Order Fulfillment & Returns. Efficient order fulfillment and returns are essential for a seamless customer experience. Key solution capabilities include streamlined order capture and orchestration, intelligent omnichannel returns management, and predictive replenishment. Leveraging these capabilities, retailers can optimize order management, ensure hassle-free returns, and maintain optimal inventory levels, resulting in improved customer experiences and increased loyalty.

Efficient Store Operations. Streamlining store operations is critical to delivering exceptional customer experiences. Key solution capabilities include empowering store associates through client and in-store app functionalities, implementing smart in-store logistics, and optimizing point-of-sale systems. By leveraging these capabilities, retailers can enhance operational efficiency, provide personalized in-store experiences, and streamline the checkout process, ultimately improving customer satisfaction.

Sustainability in Retail. Sustainability is a growing concern for consumers and society as a whole. Key solution capabilities to address sustainability in retail include implementing re-commerce initiatives, offering eco-friendly checkout and delivery options, and promoting awareness of product carbon footprints. These capabilities allow retailers to showcase their commitment to the environment, attract socially conscious consumers, and contribute to a greener future.

Constant innovation is necessary to maintain profitable growth in the rapidly changing automotive industry.

The traditional approach of working closely with a few OEMs to supply specific parts is no longer sustainable due to three trends reshaping the industry.

• These trends include the disruptive impact of vehicle electrification, which reduces the need for hardware and increases the importance of software. Additionally, there are numerous ways to monetize the vast amounts of data generated by connected vehicles.
• Many OEMs are also expanding globally, requiring suppliers to adapt to support their international operations.
• There is a shift in consumer behavior towards digital retailing.

To stay ahead, businesses must adapt to these changes and find innovative solutions to thrive in this new world.

The automotive industry is undergoing significant transformations, which are opening fresh prospects for automotive suppliers to expand their business. With the global supply chain and the push towards electrification, automotive suppliers have the chance to establish themselves as reliable and proactive partners to their customers. By supplying the necessary components for electric vehicle manufacturing, they can grow their business. However, to fully capitalize on these opportunities, automotive suppliers need to integrate data, processes, and personnel effectively. This will enable them to foster efficient operations within their organization and generate revenue from both new and existing customers.

The Automotive industry faces common difficulties:

1. Many automotive suppliers have established systems and processes that are not easily adaptable to newer digital technologies. Moving from traditional methods to digital platforms can be a complex and time-consuming process. This can lead to disjointed systems that hinder various business processes like data management, pipeline management, project planning, forecasting, and reporting.
2. Sales, R&D, and Quality departments require close collaboration to secure new programs and manage ongoing business. However, organizations often struggle with disconnected tasks and heavy workloads due to the complexity of internal processes related to quotations and negotiations.
3. The challenges mentioned above create friction and make it difficult to utilize digital solutions for tasks such as registering, onboarding, and managing customers, accessing and managing customer and product data, engaging with customers and partners, expanding into new markets, and building a loyal customer base.

Four specific applications have been identified that demonstrate vital success strategies for automotive suppliers:

1. Establishing secure and trusted partnerships through seamless onboarding: It is crucial for automotive suppliers to seamlessly onboard partners using identity and access management (IAM) to ensure security, compliance, efficiency, and effective collaboration. This is particularly important in an industry that heavily relies on protecting intellectual property and managing complex supply chain relationships.
2. Achieving sales excellence through key account management: Key account management plays a vital role for automotive suppliers as it helps establish strategic relationships, drive revenue, enhance customer retention, and position the supplier as a trusted partner capable of delivering customized solutions and innovative products.
3. Attaining aftersales service excellence: Automotive suppliers must prioritize them to foster customer loyalty, build a positive brand reputation, differentiate themselves in the market, and ensure long-term success in a competitive and dynamic industry. They provide exceptional service and support after the sale, enhancing exceptional service and support after the sale, enhancing customer loyalty, and leading to repeat business and positive word-of-mouth referrals.
4. Embracing digital customer experience and B2B commerce: Automotive suppliers should adopt digital customer experience and B2B commerce practices to optimize supply chain management, streamline order processing, expand global reach, enhance customer experience, and align with the broader digital transformation in the business landscape. Implementing effective B2B e-commerce strategies significantly contributes to the success and competitiveness of automotive suppliers in today's marketplace.