Issue link: https://mastery.commandalkon.com/i/1440159
commandalkon.com | 40 "The future is already here, it's just not evenly distributed." I have always liked this quote by author William Gibson because it captures a reality that there are often wide disparities in the adoption of technology. In his important book, Crossing the Chasm, management consultant Geoffrey Moore captured the idea that there is a technology adoption lifecycle. In the heavy building materials industry, there has historically been a slow and steady migration towards technology. However, we have recently seen an acceleration of customers who are embracing digital change. A 2020 McKinsey Global Survey of executives found that the surveyed companies have accelerated the digitization of their customer and supply-chain interactions and of their internal operations by three to four years. One factor has certainly been the COVID-19 pandemic. Other factors that we see impacting this accelerated technology adoption include supply chain challenges, skilled labor shortage, material costs, and environmental sustainability. At Command Alkon, we have been helping thousands of customers with their technology needs for over 45 years, and we have seen customers who tend to adopt new innovations at different stages as outlined in Moore's graph. About five years ago, we began hearing a consistent message from our customer base that they wanted to better leverage technology in their operations to break down the silos between functional groups and IT systems, integrate electronically with trading partners and leverage network-based business intelligence, optimization, and analytics tools to convert data into actionable information. Based on this feedback, we began investing significantly in our own technology solution that could unify our point solutions and truly serve as a platform by which customers could accomplish these goals. Fortunately, we now have this platform in place; our CONNEX Innovators Early Adopters Early Majority Late Majority Laggards Chasm Technology Adoption Life Cycle Area under curve represents number of customers We began hearing a consistent message from our customer base that they wanted to better leverage technology in their operations to break down the silos between functional groups and IT systems, integrate electronically with trading partners and leverage network-based business intelligence, optimization, and analytics tools to convert data into actionable information.