TRENDS

IT AND ANALYTICS
DOSSIER
 Presents

IT and Analytics Guide 2022-23

For queries and suggestions, mail to:

summit@nmims.edu.in

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 Table of Contents
1. Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………..3
2. Global Technological events in 2022…………………………………………………………………...3
3. What’s going on with layoffs in the Tech Industry?................................................................................4
4. Cloud Computing……………………………………………………………………………………….6
5. Internet of Things (IOT)……………………………………………………………………………….10
6. Machine Learning……………………………………………………………………………………...12
7. Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality………………………………………………………………..16
8. Natural Language Processing………………………………………………………………………….17
9. Blockchain……………………………………………………………………………………………..18
10. Cryptocurrency………………………………………………………………………………………...19
11. 5G……………………………………………………………………………………………………...20
12. Social Media Analytics………………………………………………………………………………...24
13. Quantum Computing…………………………………………………………………………………..25
14. Cybersecurity…………………………………………………………………………………………..26
15. Web 3.0………………………………………………………………………………………………...31
16. NFT………………………………………………………………………………………………….....34
17. Metaverse………………………………………………………………………………………………36
18. Artificial Intelligence…………………………………………………………………………………..38
19. ChatGPT……………………………………………………………………………………………….41
20. GPT-4…………………………………………………………………………………………………..44
21. Project Management…………………………………………………………………………………...45
22. Product Management…………………………………………………………………………………..48
23. Technology Consulting………………………………………………………………………………...55
24. Analytics……………………………………………………………………………………………….58
25. Data Analytics and Consulting…………………………………………………………………………63
26. Technology in Finance…………………………………………………………………………………66
27. Technology in Marketing………………………………………………………………………………68
28. Technology in Operations……………………………………………………………………………...74

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Introduction
The role of IT in business is seen in how it can help the company become more productive, increase
performance, save money, improve the customer experience, streamline communications and enhance
managerial decision-making. It also plays a role in helping companies expand globally and in providing staff
access to company information wherever and whenever they need it.

Information Technology (IT) can be defined as the utilization of hardware, software, services and infrastructure
to create, store, exchange and leverage information in its various forms to accomplish multiple business
objectives. Additionally, the term encompasses the workers that develop, implement, maintain and utilize
information technology directly and indirectly.

➢ IT Hardware – computers, tablets, mobile phones, printers, servers, etc.

➢ Software – productivity applications, network applications, security applications, etc.
➢ IT Services – integration, maintenance, repair, application development, managed services, etc.
➢ IT Infrastructure – the Internet backbone, fibre optic networks, data centres, etc. Information– text data,
documents, voice, video and images, etc.
➢ Business Objectives – migration, communication, collaboration, efficiency, insight, production, e-
commerce, etc.

Global technological events in 2022

February onwards: Ukraine war sparks tech retreat from Russia: In February, Russia invaded Ukraine,
showing how geopolitical upheaval can affect tech companies as well as other sectors. The invasion was widely
condemned, and major technology companies stopped selling to Russia and blocked their services. IBM, Intel,
Samsung, Ericsson, and Nokia have suspended sales to Russia, while AWS and Google have stopped accepting
new customers and suspended services to the country. To combat disinformation, media and social networks
have tightened restrictions on Russian state media content.
March: Lapsus$ hackers wreak havoc throughout tech: The Lapsus$ hacking and ransomware group
released Bing, Bing Maps, and Cortana source code in March. Social engineering was used to compromise a
corporate account and steal Microsoft data. The group's victims include Samsung, Nvidia, Vodafone, and Okta.
Lapsus$'s "poorly thought out" tactics and UK arrests revealed inexperienced teen hackers. The group's
activities showed the dangers of ransomware and showed that hacker groups can succeed against even well-
hardened targets without technical sophistication.
April: Elon Musk buys Twitter, gets rejected as CEO: After a lengthy will-he-or-won't-he fan dance that
apparently wasn't long enough for due diligence, emerald mine heir, serial entrepreneur, and dangerous car
maker Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion. After the sale was completed, Musk made unpopular changes,
engaged in far-right conspiracy theorising, and fired many social network employees. After a Twitter poll
showed that users wanted him out, he said he would stay until he found someone "foolish enough to take the
job." Whether or not a social media company is a "technology company," business leaders of all stripes are
watching Musk for lessons on how not to run a company.

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April onwards: Layoffs sweep tech sector: Amazon, Meta, and Google have long led tech hiring, and this year
they did so for different reasons. Due to global economic headwinds, the three tech giants and many other
smaller tech companies laid off thousands of employees this year. Amazon may lay off 20,000 workers,
illustrating the technology job market's shift. The layoffs contrast with the early stages of the pandemic, when
large tech companies hired to capitalise on cloud-based service demand. Revenue dropped after the surge,
bringing uncertainty and staff cuts.
May: Broadcom to buy VMware for $61 billion: The technology M&A market slowed in 2022, but big-
money deals like Microsoft's proposed $68.7 billion acquisition of Activation Blizzard were still plentiful (still
under regulatory review). Broadcom's $61 billion acquisition of VMware in late May was the enterprise
computing sector's highlight. Broadcom's bottom line, software-hardware synergies, and multicloud computing
offerings will benefit. The US, UK, and EU regulators have launched inquiries that have not yet concluded, and
they are likely listening to critics who say Broadcom has a history of buying companies, shutting down R&D,
and raising prices.
November: ChatGPT wows the world: The OpenAI Foundation's ChatGPT test release, which combines
natural-language processing with search, has taken the internet by storm. According to reviewers, it would
easily pass a Turing test, creating extremely human-like responses to writing prompts, but it still has many of
the flaws of previous AI-based systems—it makes things up, is limited by the biases of the information it seeks
out, and does not specify the provenance of the information it uses. It may be useful as a composition tool, but
it won't replace writing anytime soon.
December: FTX collapses, spurring calls for crypto regulation: In November, crypto exchange FTX
collapsed amid allegations of mismanagement and wrongdoing, causing $8 billion in assets to vanish. In
December, FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas and extradited to the US to face
criminal charges. The FTX collapse highlighted crypto's volatility this year. Experts say cryptocurrency will
suffer if regulators don't regulate trading.
US-China chip war and the end of globalization: In December 2022, US President Biden's administration
issued new export controls that prevented US companies from selling advanced semiconductors and equipment
to certain Chinese manufacturers, and in December expanded those restrictions. Industry insiders said the
restrictions signalled the end of globalisation and would disrupt the supply chain for all kinds of chip-based
products, from computers to electronic vehicles, catching enterprises of all kinds in the crossfire between the
two global superpowers.

What’s going on with layoffs in the Tech Industry?

Major tech companies, including Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Salesforce, IBM, Cisco, and Uber, are
implementing cost-cutting measures such as layoffs and downsizing in response to economic challenges in
2023. Here are the details.
The tech industry, known for its rapid expansion and explosive growth, is now facing a new reality. The
economy is cooling, and consumer spending is slowing, prompting major players such as Google, Microsoft,
Amazon, and Salesforce to take drastic measures to stay afloat. With significant cuts already announced in the
new year, the industry braces for a wave of layoffs that could have far-reaching consequences.

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While many tech companies are still larger than they were three years ago, the trend of downsizing is set to
continue in 2023 as the industry shifts its focus from rapid expansion to cost-cutting measures. Wedbush
analysts predict that tech layoffs will remain a trend throughout the year, as companies in Silicon Valley adapt
to the evolving economic climate.
These layoffs are a peculiar outlier in an otherwise strong employment environment: The unemployment rate
has hovered between 3.4% and 3.7% since April 2022, bureau data shows. And quit rates — which reflect
worker confidence — this year are consistently at some of the highest levels in more than 20 years, according
to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
Employment, at large, is doing well. But when layoffs are happening in the most visible sector on the internet,
you’re going to hear about it. The biggest tech layoffs have occurred at high-profile companies. Here are some
of the biggest layoffs in tech since 2022, beginning with the most recent:

Fig: Largest Tech Layoffs

➢ On March 23, Accenture, an IT company, announced it would lay off 19,000 staff members — about
2.5% of its workforce — over the next 18 months.
➢ On March 20, Amazon announced plans for another round of layoffs this time totalling about 9,000
employees — about 3% of its workforce. Amazon had previously laid off about 18,000 employees
between November and January.
➢ On March 14, Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, announced it would lay off 10,000 of its
employees. Previously, on Nov. 9, Meta, laid off more than 11,000 employees — about 13% of its staff
at the time.
➢ On Feb. 8, Zoom Video Communications, Inc. announced it would lay off 15% of its staff or about
1,300 employees.
➢ On Feb. 6, the computer company Dell announced it would lay off 5% of its staff or about 6,650
employees.
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 ➢ On Jan. 23, Spotify, one of the most popular audio streaming services, announced it would lay off 6%
of its staff or about 600 employees.
➢ On Jan. 20, Google-parent Alphabet announced it would be laying off 12,000 of its workers.
➢ On Jan. 18, Microsoft, arguably the biggest name in computer software, announced that it would be
laying off 10,000 members of its staff.
➢ Twitter laid off about half of its staff soon after Elon Musk took the helm in late October 2022. Then on
Nov. 16, Musk gave employees an ultimatum to commit to a new “hardcore” Twitter or take severance:
More than 1,200 employees reportedly opted for the latter.

Cloud Computing
The practice of using a network of remote servers hosted on the Internet to store, manage, and process
data, rather than a local server or a personal computer. It reduces upfront infrastructure cost so that the
organization can focus on projects. Cloud resources are usually not only shared by multiple users but as
well as dynamically re-allocated as per demand. This can work for allocating resources to users in
different time zones.

Fig: Features of Cloud Computing

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Choosing the RIGHT Cloud Platform!
Cloud Computing has come a long way since its inception. It’s no longer a question of whether to opt for Cloud
Computing or not; now, the question is which cloud platform to go for. With the Cloud Computing market,
flooded with numerous cloud providers, AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform stand out proudly as the
top three cloud providers. So, how do you decide which one to choose? How do you conclude the big AWS
vs Azure vs Google Cloud debate? First, we will get an overview of all the top 3 cloud providers:

➢ Amazon Web Services (AWS): AWS is a cloud computing platform that provides a wide range of
services such as computing, storage, and databases, as well as tools for machine learning, artificial
intelligence, and the Internet of Things (IoT). Flexibility, security, scalability, and better performance
are some important features of AWS. Some popular companies that use AWS include Netflix, Airbnb,
and Spotify.
➢ Microsoft Azure: Azure is a cloud computing platform offered by Microsoft. It is a worldwide cloud
platform that is used for building, deploying, and managing services. It supports multiple programming
languages such as Java, Nodejs, C, and C#. It provides services such as virtual machines, storage, and
databases, as well as tools for analytics, AI, and IoT. Some popular companies that use Azure include
Coca-Cola, BMW, and Boeing.
➢ Google Cloud Platform (GCP): GCP is a cloud computing platform offered by Google that provides
services such as compute, storage, and databases, as well as tools for data analytics, machine learning,
and IoT. The advantage of GCP is that it supports various databases such as SQL, MYSQL, Oracle,
Sam, and more. Some popular companies that use GCP include Snapchat, Spotify, and PayPal.

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 Fig: Market Share of all the Top Cloud Platforms

Now, we will do a comparative study on the various services each of these 3 cloud providers have:

Fig: Services by AWS, Azure and GCP

Now, let’s wrap up this Azure vs AWS vs Google Cloud blog and take a look at the most significant pros and
cons of these three cloud giants.

➢ Establishment: With a head start of 5 years, the winner here is AWS.

➢ Availability zones: With a greater number of regions and availability zones, the winner here is AWS.
➢ Market Shares: With around one-third of market shares in its name, the winner here is AWS.
➢ Growth rate: Having a growth rate of almost 100 percent, the winner is GCP.
➢ Who uses them: With various high-end customers using all three cloud platforms, it’s a tie!
➢ Services:
o When it comes to the number of services, the winner is AWS.
o Regarding the integration with open-source and on-premise systems, such as MS tools, that are
mostly used in almost all organizations, the winner is Azure.
➢ Pricing Models: With more customer-friendly pricing models and discount models, the winner here is
Google Cloud.

With AWS scoring more points in this cloud battle of Azure vs AWS vs Google Cloud, it easily comes out on
top of all the major cloud providers, today. However, it’s hard to say for how long AWS will wear the crown of
the leading cloud provider, given that Azure and GCP are relentlessly working their way up on the top cloud
providers list. Even though AWS has the added advantage of being the first one of its kind, Azure and GCP also

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have their own set of strengths. Using Azure Cloud makes more sense to several organizations that use MS
tools since it’s easy to integrate MS tools with Azure Cloud. And, GCP offering the best pricing model for the
infrastructure, on which Google Search engine and YouTube run, is the only reason customers need to go for
GCP.

Resources

➢ https://intellipaat.com/blog/aws-vs-azure-vs-google-cloud/
➢ https://www.javatpoint.com/aws-vs-azure-vs-google-cloud-platform
➢ https://www.statista.com/chart/18819/worldwide-market-share-of-leading-cloud-infrastructure-
service-providers/
➢ https://tutorialsdojo.com/aws-vs-azure-vs-gcp-which-one-should-i-learn/

Internet of Things (IOT)

The internet of things is a system of interrelated computing devices, mechanical and digital machines, objects,
animals or people that are provided with unique identifiers and the ability to transfer data over a network without
requiring human-to-human or human-to-computer interaction.

Fig: IoT Solutions Architecture

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How IOT Works?

An IoT ecosystem consists of web-enabled smart devices that use embedded processors, sensors and
communication hardware to collect, send and act on data they acquire from their environments. IoT devices
share the sensor data they collect by connecting to an IoT gateway or other edge device where data is either
sent to the cloud to be analysed or analysed locally. Sometimes, these devices communicate with other related
devices and act on the information they get from one another. The devices do most of the work without human
intervention, although people can interact with the devices -- for instance, to set them up, give them instructions
or access the data. The connectivity, networking and communication protocols used with these web-enabled
devices largely depend on the specific IoT applications deployed.

Real World Applications of Internet of Things (IoT) across different sectors

GE Digital’s Predix Platform: GE created Predix Platform to address the unique needs of industrial companies
on the path to digitization. Predix Platform is a distributed application platform that’s purpose- built for the
digital industrial era.

It captures and analyses the unique volume, velocity, and variety of machine data in a secure, industrial- strength
cloud environment.

Further Readings:

➢ https://www.ge.com/digital/iiot-platform
➢ https://www.ge.com/digital/blog/industrial-iot-how-connected-things-are-changing- manufacturing

Wipro’s Internet of Things (IoT) solutions: Wipro’s Internet of Things (IoT) solutions address connectivity of
‘legacy’ and ‘new’ things. Our Multi-Protocol IoT Gateway Framework amalgamates heterogeneous protocols
that complement IoT at the edge, allowing select data to be transmitted to backend systems. The solutions are
spread across Fleet & Asset Management for real-time tracking of assets, Integration with cloud-based data
storage and analytics and flexible rules-based Smart Drone Framework for field operations.

Further Reading: https://www.wipro.com/en-IN/infrastructure/internet-of-things-iot/

IBM’s Cognitive IoT for Healthcare: IBM Watson Health is transforming healthcare by helping organizations
across the healthcare industry leverage data, technology and expertise to solve clinical, operational and financial
problems.

Further Readings:

➢ https://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view_group.php?id=7866
➢ https://www.ibm.com/in-en/cloud/internet-of-things

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 Fig: Trends in IOT

Machine Learning
Machine learning is an application of artificial intelligence (AI) that provides systems the ability to
automatically learn and improve from experience without being explicitly programmed. Machine
learning focuses on the development of computer programs that can access data and use it to learn for
themselves. As it is evident from the name, it gives the computer that which makes it more similar to
humans: The ability to learn. Machine learning is actively being used today, perhaps in many more
places than one would expect.
Machine Learning Methods

➢ Supervised machine learning algorithms

➢ Unsupervised machine learning algorithms
➢ Semi-supervised machine learning algorithms
➢ Reinforcement machine learning algorithms

Applications:

Marketing

“75% of enterprises using AI and machine learning enhance customer satisfaction by more than 10%.”
Measuring marketing’s many contributions to revenue growth is becoming more accurate and real- time
thanks to analytics and machine learning. The following are 10 ways machine learning is revolutionizing
marketing today and in the future:

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 ➢ Using a concerted approach to applying AI and machine learning across a retailer’s value chains
has the potential to deliver a 50% improvement of assortment efficiency and a 30% online sales
increase using dynamic pricing.
➢ Machine learning is streamlining creation, fine-tuning and revenue contributions of up-sell and
cross-sell strategies by automating the entire progress.
➢ Lead scoring accuracy is improving, leading to increased sales that are traceable back to initial
marketing campaigns and sales strategies.
➢ Identifying and defining the sales projections of specific customer segments and micro segments
using RFM (recency, frequency and monetary) modelling within machine learning apps is
becoming pervasive.
➢ Optimizing the marketing mix by determining which sales offers, incentive and programs are
presented to which prospects through which channels is another way machine learning is
revolutionizing marketing.

Finance

Leading banks and financial services companies are deploying AI technology, including machine learning
(ML), to streamline their processes, optimize portfolios, decrease risk and underwrite loans amongst other
things. Due to the high volume of historical financial data generated in the industry, ML has found many useful
applications in finance. The following are some of the current applications of machine learning in finance:

Portfolio Management: Robo-Advisors: provides automated financial guidance and service. They
provide portfolio management services that use algorithms and statistics to automatically establish and
manage the investment portfolio of a client

Fig: How a Predictive Model Works

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Algorithmic Trading: is the use of algorithms to conduct trades autonomously. It’s mostly hedge-fund
managers that make use of automated trading systems and so make use of machine learning in finance. It allows
traders to automate certain processes ensuring a competitive advantage.

High-Frequency Trading (HFT): Machines in charge of HFT is nothing new. During 2009-2010,
anywhere from 60% to 70% of U.S. trading was attributed to HFT. Some of the biggest players include
companies like Tokyo-based Nomura Securities, Two Sigma Securities, Citadel Securities, Tower
Research Capital and DRW, but there are many more operating in financial markets worldwide.
Fraud Detection: Fraud is a massive problem for financial institutions and one of the foremost reasons
to leveraged machine learning in finance. This is because ML systems can scan through vast data sets,
detect unusual activities, (anomalies), and flag them instantly. ML is also the perfect candidate to tackle
the problem of false positives, which is something that happens regularly in finance.
Operations

Machine learning makes it possible to discover patterns in supply chain data by relying on algorithms
that quickly pinpoint the most influential factors to a supply networks’ success. Key factors influencing
inventory levels, supplier quality, demand forecasting, procure-to-pay, order-to-cash, production
planning, transportation management and more are becoming known for the first time. The ten ways
machine learning is revolutionizing supply chain management include:
➢ Machine learning algorithms and the apps running them are capable of analysing large, diverse
data sets fast, improving demand forecasting accuracy.
➢ Reducing freight costs, improving supplier delivery performance, and minimizing supplier risk
are three of the many benefits machine learning is providing in collaborative supply chain
networks.
➢ Machine Learning and its core constructs are ideally suited for providing insights into improving
supply chain management performance not available from previous technologies.
➢ Machine learning excels at visual pattern recognition, opening up many potential applications in
physical inspection and maintenance of physical assets across an entire supply chain network.
Industry Examples
IBM
IBM’s Watson’s been following self-learning behaviour models and has done everything from
diagnosing certain types of cancers more effectively than oncologists, writing songs, and producing
movie trailers. In the case of cancer treatments, Watson can read half a million medical research papers
in 15 seconds and was trained at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York to be able to suggest diagnoses
and treatments to doctors.
Amazon

On the retail side, everything from product recommendations to supply chain, forecasting, and capacity
planning runs on machine-learning, while programs like Macie and Glue that scan for sensitive data breaches

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and perform data cleansing, respectively. Of course, let’s not forget Alexa, Prime Air, and Amazon Go, which
all function through AI algorithms, while rumours of an AI fashion designer are feeding the Amazon AI flame.

Google

Google was one of the pioneers of machine learning with suggested searches and ever-evolving search ranking
algorithms. Google’s Machine Intelligence efforts have focused on deep learning, which involves multiple
layers of neural networks—built to simulate human thought processes— that allow Google’s technology to
process data more thoroughly.

Netflix
The online streaming giant announced an AI algorithm called Dynamic Optimizer to analyse each and
every frame of video in each of its roughly 13,000 titles it streams and compresses it without sacrificing
image quality.
Virtual Personal Assistants
Siri, Alexa, Google Now are some of the popular examples of virtual personal assistants. As the name
suggests, they assist in finding information, when asked over voice. All you need to do is activate them
and ask “What is my schedule for today?”, “What are the flights from Germany to London”, or similar
questions. For answering, your personal assistant looks out for the information, recalls your related
queries, or send a command to other resources (like phone apps) to collect info. You can even instruct
assistants for certain tasks like “Set an alarm for 6 AM next morning”, “Remind me to visit Visa Office
day after tomorrow”.

Fig: Global Machine Learning market 2020-2024

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Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality
Virtual reality
Users are completely immersed in a computer-generated reality when they experience virtual reality. Virtual
reality is the most well-known of immersive technologies. Gaming and entertainment were early adopters of
virtual reality.

Fig: Difference between AR & VR

Industry Applications

Automotive industry - VR allows engineers and designers to experiment easily with the look and
build of a vehicle before commissioning expensive prototypes. Brands such as BMW and Jaguar Land
Rover already use VR to hold early design and engineering reviews to check the visual design and
object obscuration of the vehicle - all before any money has been spent on physically manufacturing
the parts.
Healthcare - Healthcare in an important application where VR can have a significant impact.
Healthcare professionals now use virtual models to prepare themselves for working on real bodies and
VR has even been used as pain relief for burn injuries.
Augmented Reality
Do you remember the Pokémon GO craze? That’s the most well-known application of augmented
reality—technology that overlays digital information on the real world. Rather than provide a fully
immersive virtual experience, augmented reality enhances the real-world with images, text, and other
virtual information via devices such as heads-up displays, smartphones, tablets, smart lenses, and AR
glasses.

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Industry Applications

Training - every industry needs to train the new recruits. AR is used to create training programs and
step by step instructions are given to the trainees. This creates more engaging and interactive training
programs.

Natural Language Processing

Natural Language Processing (NLP) refers to an AI method of communicating with intelligent systems
using a natural language such as English. Processing of Natural Language is required when you want
an intelligent system like a robot to perform as per your instructions, when you want to hear decisions
from a dialogue based clinical expert system, etc.

Fig: NLP Applications

These underlying tasks are often used in higher-level NLP capabilities, such as:
➢ Content categorization: A linguistic-based document summary, including search and
indexing, content alerts and duplication detection
➢ Topic discovery and modelling: Accurately capture the meaning and themes in text
collections, and apply advanced analytics to text, like optimization and forecasting.
➢ Contextual extraction: Automatically pull structured information from text-based sources.
Sentiment analysis: Identifying the mood or subjective opinions within large amounts of text,
including average sentiment and opinion mining.
➢ Speech-to-text and text-to-speech conversion: Transforming voice commands into written
text, and vice versa.
➢ Document summarization: Automatically generating synopses of large bodies of text.
➢ Machine translation: Automatic translation of text or speech from one language to another.

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Blockchain
Blockchain is a technology which can be used to develop applications, such as social networks,
messengers, games, exchanges, storage platforms, voting systems, prediction markets, online shops and
much more. In this sense, it is similar to the internet, which is why some have dubbed it “The Internet
3.0”. A blockchain is, in the simplest of terms, a time-stamped series of immutable records of data that
is managed by a cluster of computers not owned by any single entity. Each of these blocks of data (i.e.,
block) is secured and bound to each other using cryptographic principles (i.e., chain).

Fig: Working of Blockchain

Fig: Blockchain Trends

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Cryptocurrency

A cryptocurrency (or crypto currency) is a digital asset designed to work as a medium of exchange
using cryptography to secure the transactions and to control the creation of additional units of the
currency. Cryptocurrencies are classified as a subset of digital currencies and are also classified as a
subset of alternative currencies and virtual currencies. Bitcoin and its derivatives use decentralized
control as opposed to centralized electronic money/centralized banking systems. The decentralized
control is related to the use of bitcoin’s blockchain transaction database in the role of a distributed
ledger.

Fig: Cryptocurrency risks

5G
➢ 5G is the 5th generation mobile network. It is a new global wireless standard after 1G, 2G, 3G,
and 4G networks. 5G enables a new kind of network that is designed to connect virtually
everyone and everything together including machines, objects, and devices.
➢ 5G is based on OFDM (Orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing), a method of modulating
a digital signal across several different channels to reduce interference.
➢ 5G wireless technology is meant to deliver higher multi-Gbps peak data speeds, ultra-low
latency, more reliability, massive network capacity, increased availability, and a more uniform
user experience to more users.

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 Fig: 5G Technology Trends

Barriers to 5G Adoption:
➢ One major obstacle is that network providers will need to install a lot of new, and expensive,
infrastructure.
➢ With 5G signals tending to travel relatively short distances, network providers will need to
deploy more antennas and base stations to ensure broad coverage.

5G in India:
➢ During the AGM 2020, RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani announced the plans for 'homegrown
5G' network in India. At the event, Ambani revealed that Jio has developed a 5G solution from
scratch and that it will be ready for trials as soon as 5G spectrum is available and can be ready
for field deployment in 2021.
➢ Currently, India does not have 5G services and the government has not yet allocated spectrum
to telecom operators for running field trials aimed at promoting domestic ecosystems for 5G.

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Applications

Fig: 5G Applications

Recent Trends in 5G
The fifth-generation of mobile networking technology, or 5G, has been top of mind for the telecom
industry in recent years and the buzz has trickled into almost every other market as businesses look for
ways to manage change through new connectivity options.
Here are some of the most important 5G trends that solution providers should be aware of this year as
the latest cellular technology becomes a viable connectivity option.

5G’s Impact on IoT

5G is going to help further IoT because of the latency and bandwidth improvements it can offer. The
IoT opportunities that will especially benefit from mobile and cellular connectivity include
transportation, manufacturing, farming, and smart cities use cases. And 5G could even make new and
emerging use cases and applications a true reality for the first time, such as connected cars, which
require lightning-fast, low-latency technologies.

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Aside from the cutting-edge use cases, many industries right now need highly reliable low-latency
wireless links that can power applications as quickly as possible for their existing IoT use cases.
Connected Communities
Smart cities have become a major IoT trend in recent years as metro areas all around the world equip
indoor and outdoor areas with sensors to collect data and gain insights to better manage their assets,
resources and services.
5G is the technology that the smart city and connected communities use cases have been looking for.
Existing 4G networks are limited in its support for simultaneous connections, high power consumption
and high price per bit. 5G, on the other hand, is expected to drive smart city applications by addressing
these issues and in return, harness the newly captured data to improve city operations.

5G And Security
As the amount of 5G implementations increase, the need for good security will become even more
critical. Carriers, such as AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile have been bolstering their next- generation
networks with added encryption and additional defences at the edge of the network.
But 5G, unlike previous iterations of cellular technology, will be made up of a mostly software- based
network, so securing 5G is a different kind of endeavour. The applications that will ride on top of the
5G network, such as IoT and smart city apps, will also require additional layers of security to lock down
the new devices and connections that will be joining the network.

5G At the Edge
The link between 5G and edge computing is all about latency. 5G promises to fuel innovation at the
edge by powering brand-new use case, enabling more data collection and faster processing than ever
before, while giving businesses and organizations another connectivity option.
By combining 5G and edge computing, organizations will be able to outfit devices like smart cameras
and sensors to collect more data, which will drive more compute use cases at the edge. This will result
in expanding opportunities for solution providers in collecting data at the edge, channel partners told
CRN.
According to research firm IDC, the worldwide edge computing market is forecast to reach
approximately $250 billion in 2024 with a compound annual growth rate of 12.5 percent over the next
four years. 5G technology is expected to act as a catalyst for that market growth.

Social Media Analytics

Social media analytics is the practice of gathering data from social media websites and analyzing that
data using social media analytics tools to make business decisions. The most common use of social
media analytics is to mine customer sentiment to support marketing and customer service activities.

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This is considered the basic foundation for enabling an enterprise to:
➢ Execute focused engagements like one-to-one and one-to-many
➢ Enhance social collaboration over a variety of business functions, such as customer service,
marketing, support, etc.
➢ Maximize the customer experience

Social media is a good medium to understand real-time consumer choices, intentions and sentiments.
The most prevalent application of social media analytics is to get to know the customer base on a more
emotional level to help better target customer service and marketing.

The initial step during a social media analytics program is to figure out which business objectives can
gain an advantage from the data that is collected and evaluated. Standard goals include: maximizing
business earnings, decreasing customer service expenditures, obtaining feedback on services and
products, and enhancing public opinion about a business division or specific product. As soon as the
business goals are determined, key performance indicators (KPIs) to perform objective evaluation of
the data must be outlined.

The advantages of implementing social media tools include:

➢ Competitive Advantage: SMA tools allow the organizations to gain a competitive edge over their
competitors by facilitating a much better comprehension of their brands. This usually includes an
understanding of how the customers make use of particular services or products, what issues are
faced by the customers while using these services or products, and getting to know how customers'
views about a particular company or product.
➢ Learn from the Customers: In many cases, customers may have effective solutions for some of
the issues faced by an organization. For example, if a product is in the market without proper
documentation, the chances of use errors increase. Some users may solve these problems through
trial-and-error, and then post their findings in forums, which can help the company determine
whether better documentation is required, and what users really need to know.
➢ Improve Products and Services: This is the key goal of SMA. There are countless tweets, blogs,
comments and complaints regarding products and services. This huge volume of information
contains consumer sentiments that can be used to evaluate users' experience with a particular
product or service. This information can then be used to help companies perform better.

Quantum Computing

➢ Quantum computing is a cutting-edge field of computer technology that uses the principles of
quantum theory to revolutionize how we process information. Unlike classical computers that use
bits to encode information as either a 1 or 0, quantum computers use quantum bits or qubits, which
can exist in multiple states simultaneously. This unique property, known as superposition, allows

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 quantum computers to perform operations at exponentially faster speeds than conventional
computers while consuming far less energy.
➢ Quantum computing has the potential to transform a wide range of industries, including finance,
military affairs, intelligence, drug discovery, aerospace design, utilities (nuclear fusion), polymer
design, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Big Data search, and digital manufacturing. As a result, some
of the biggest technology companies in the world, such as IBM, Microsoft, Google, and Alibaba,
are investing heavily in the development of quantum computing technology.
➢ There are numerous applications of quantum computing in various fields, including

Fig: Applications of Quantum Computing

➢ Quantum annealing can solve optimization problems much faster than classical computers,
allowing for more efficient global minimal point solutions.
➢ Machine Learning/Big Data: Quantum computing can accelerate the process of training and testing
models using large data sets, leading to faster and more accurate results.
➢ Simulation: Quantum computing can simulate complex systems with greater accuracy, allowing
for better predictions and decision-making.
➢ Material Science: Quantum computing can model the complex interactions of atomic structures in
chemistry and material science, providing a faster and more precise way to understand and design
new materials.
➢ Overall, quantum computing represents a ground-breaking advancement in computer technology
with the potential to revolutionize numerous industries and transform the way we process and
analyse information.

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Cybersecurity

Cyber security refers to the body of technologies, processes, and practices designed to protect networks,
devices, programs, and data from attack, damage, or unauthorized access. Cyber security may also be
referred to as information technology security.
Cyber security is important because government, military, corporate, financial, and medical organizations
collect, process, and store unprecedented amounts of data on computers and other devices. A significant
portion of that data can be sensitive information, whether that be intellectual property, financial data,
personal information, or other types of data for which unauthorized access or exposure could have
negative consequences. Organizations transmit sensitive data across networks and to other devices in the
course of doing businesses, and cyber security describes the discipline dedicated to protecting that
information and the systems used to process or store it. As the volume and sophistication of cyber-attacks
grow, companies and organizations, especially those that are tasked with safeguarding information
relating to national security, health, or financial records, need to take steps to protect their sensitive
business and personnel information.

Fig: Cybersecurity Trends

Challenges of Cyber Security

For an effective cyber security, an organization needs to coordinate its efforts throughout its entire
information system. Elements of cyber encompass all of the following:
Network security: The process of protecting the network from unwanted users, attacks and intrusions.
Application security: Apps require constant updates and testing to ensure these programs are secure from
attacks.

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Endpoint security: Remote access is a necessary part of business, but can also be a weak point for data.
Endpoint security is the process of protecting remote access to a company’s network.
Data security: Inside of networks and applications is data. Protecting company and customer information
is a separate layer of security.
Identity management: Essentially, this is a process of understanding the access every individual has in
an organization.
Database and infrastructure security: Everything in a network involves databases and physical
equipment. Protecting these devices is equally important.
Cloud security: Many files are in digital environments or “the cloud”. Protecting data in a 100% online
environment presents a large number of challenges.
Mobile security: Cell phones and tablets involve virtually every type of security challenge in and of
themselves.
Disaster recovery/business continuity planning: In the event of a breach, natural disaster or other event
data must be protected and business must go on. For this, you’ll need a plan. End-user education: Users
may be employees accessing the network or customers logging on to a company app. Educating good
habits (password changes, 2-factor authentication, etc.) is an important part of cybersecurity.

There remains a lot of speculation about what happens after the pandemic, but six things appear to be
certain:
Some organizations will need to move to new operating models For these companies, immediately after the
crisis, cybersecurity and IT rights will require careful examination and handling. Remote worker monitoring
and support will become vital. And for workers who transition from home back to the office, cybersecurity
professionals must ensure stringent system and access scrutiny prior to allowing the shifted system to connect
back to the network
Companies will need to reset their security systems to ensure there are no outliers. Both physical and
digital systems will need to be restarted, to check for any digital holes in the fence. System and data access
rights granted during the pandemic to enable remote work will require auditing to determine whether they
should be revoked or updated. IT systems will need to be analysed for cracks, foul paths or fraudulent
identities. The reason is that cybercriminals may have found ways to gain entry into otherwise hardened
facilities.
New cyber risks that appeared during the pandemic must be understood. For instance, security experts
will need to scrutinize the digital capabilities of critical business functions, making sure they can withstand
cyberattacks during a lockdown. They will examine critical supply chains, including digital supply chains,
to ensure continuity during a health crisis.
Corporate IT security architectures should be reassessed. This includes access mechanisms, support
needs for remote access on a mass scale, and feature risk/context-based security authentication
mechanisms.

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Updates to remote access and bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policies must be made. They should
include cybersecurity hygiene controls.
Advanced technology must be deployed. Threat detection and response capabilities must include
advanced capabilities supported by next-generation technologies like big data, artificial intelligence and
machine learning. These are needed to detect and respond to adverse behaviour at machine speed, without
human interventions. Further, organizations will want to explore insurance against losses from
cyberattacks incurred during a pandemic scenario.
Cyber Security Examples:
Encryption
Encrypting data in storage, transit and use.
Authentication

Securely identifying people and digital entities.

Authorization
Defining and implementing privileges for computing resources.
Network Security
Securing networks with techniques such as a network perimeter.
Sandboxing
Running untrusted software in a virtual environment where it can do no harm.
Internal Controls
Internal controls such as the requirement that different people write code, review the code and launch it
into production.
Security by Design
Architecting and designing systems, applications and infrastructure to be secure.
Secure Coding
A series of principles and practices for developing code that is free of security vulnerabilities.
Secure Testing
Testing cycles designed to discover security vulnerabilities.
Defense in Depth
The principle that each layer of security doesn't assume anything. For example, an application that doesn't
assume that a firewall has prevented external access

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Physical Security
Physical security such as a data centre with access controls.
Audit Trail
Logging that records interactions with systems, applications, databases and infrastructure such that
malicious activity can be detected and reconstructed.
Defensive Computing
Users who are aware of cybersecurity and are careful in their use of technology.
Non-Repudiation
The ability to prove that a commercial transaction took place.
Security Infrastructure
Foundational tools that offer security services such as a virus scanner or intrusion detection system.
Monitoring

Monitoring systems, applications and infrastructure and promptly investigating suspicious activity.

Vulnerability Management
Tracking known vulnerabilities to software and hardware and applying fixes in a timely manner.
Response to Breaches
Defending your services, resources and data from an attack

Cyber Security Trends:

Rise of Automotive Hacking
The first cyber security trend in 2023 is going to be the rise of automotive hacking. Modern vehicles
nowadays come packed with automated software creating seamless connectivity for drivers in cruise
control, engine timing, door lock, airbags, and advanced systems for driver assistance. These vehicles use
Bluetooth and Wi-Fi technologies to communicate, which also opens them to several vulnerabilities or
threats from hackers. Gaining control of the vehicle or using microphones for eavesdropping is expected
to rise in 2023 with more use of automated vehicles. Self-driving or autonomous vehicles use an even
further complex mechanism that requires strict cybersecurity measures.
Integrating AI with Cyber Security
With AI being introduced in all market segments, this technology with a combination of machine learning
has brought tremendous changes in cybersecurity. AI has been paramount in building automated security
systems, natural language processing, face detection, and automatic threat detection. Although it is also
being used to develop smart malware and attacks to bypass the latest security protocols in controlling
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data. AI-enabled threat detection systems can predict new attacks and notify admins for any data breach
instantly, making it the next cyber security trend in 2023.
Mobile is the New Target

Cybersecurity trends provide a considerable increase (50 percent) for mobile banking malware or attacks
in 2019, making our handheld devices a potential prospect for hackers. All our photos, financial
transactions, emails, and messages possess more threats to individuals. Smartphone's virus or malware
may capture the attention of cybersecurity trends in 2023.
Cloud is Also Potentially Vulnerable

With more and more organizations now established on clouds, security measures need to be continuously
monitored and updated to safeguard the data from leaks. Although cloud applications such as Google or
Microsoft are well equipped with security from their end still, it's the user end that acts as a significant
source for erroneous errors, malicious software, and phishing attacks.
Data Breaches: Prime target

Data will continue to be a leading concern for organizations around the world. Whether it be for an
individual or organization, safeguarding digital data is the primary goal now. Any minor flaw or bug in
your system browser or software is a potential vulnerability for hackers to access personal information.
New strict measures General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was enforced from May 25th, 2018
onwards, offering data protection and privacy for individuals in the European Union (EU). Similarly, the
California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) was applied after January 1st, 2020, for safeguarding consumer
rights in the California area.
IoT with 5G Network: The New Era of Technology and Risks

Next raging cyber security trend for 2023 is the IoT with 5G networks. With 5G networks expected to roll
out in 2020 globally, a new era of inter-connectivity will become a reality with the Internet of Things
(IoT). This communication between multiple devices also opens them to vulnerabilities from outside
influence, attacks, or an unknown software bug. Even the world's most used browser supported by Google
Chrome was found to have serious flaws. 5G architecture is still effectively new in the industry and
requires a lot of research to find loopholes to make the system secure from external attack. Every step of
the 5G network might bring a plethora of network attacks that we might not be aware of. Here
manufacturers need to be very strict in building sophisticated 5G hardware and software to control data
breaches.
Automation and Integration

Here's the next cyber security trend - with the size of data multiplying every day, it is eminent that
automation is integrated to give more sophisticated control over the information. Modern hectic work
demand also pressurizes professionals and engineers to deliver quick and proficient solutions, making
automation more valuable than ever. Security measurements are incorporated during the agile process to
build more secure software in every aspect. Large and complex web applications are further hard to

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safeguard, making automation, as well as cyber security, to be a vital concept of the software development
process.
Targeted Ransomware

Another significant trend in cybersecurity is that we can't seem to ignore for 2020 is targeted ransomware.
Especially in the developed nation's industries rely heavily on specific software to run their daily
activities. These ransomware targets are more focused, such as the Wanna Cry attack on the National
Health Service hospitals in England Scotland corrupted more than 70,000 medical devices. Though
generally, ransomware asks to threaten to publish victim's data unless a ransom is paid still, it can affect
the large organization or in case of nations too.
State-Sponsored Cyber Warfare

There won't be any stoppage between the western and eastern powers in attempts to find superiority. The
tension between the US and Iran or Chinese hackers often creates worldwide news though the attacks are
few; they have a significant impact on an event such as elections. And with more than 70 elections bound
to be held this year, criminal activities during this time will surge.
Expect high-profile data breaches, political and industrial secrets to top cyber security trends for 2023.
Insider Threats
Human error is still one of the primary reasons for the data breach. Any bad day or intentional loophole
can bring down a whole organization with millions of stolen data. Report by Verizon in data breach gives
strategic insights on cybersecurity trends that the employees directly or indirectly made 34 percent of total
attacks. So, make sure you create more awareness within premises to safeguard data in every way possible.

Web 3.0
The web has evolved a lot over the years, and the applications of it today are almost unrecognizable from its
most early days. The evolution of the web is often partitioned into three separate stages: Web 1.0, Web 2.0,
and Web 3.0.

Web 1.0 consisted of sites serving static content instead of dynamic HTML. Data and content were served
from a static file system rather than a database, and sites didn't have much interactivity at all. It is a read only
web.
Most of us have primarily experienced the web in its current form, commonly referred to as web2. You can
think of web2 as the interactive and social web. But there are certain drawbacks. Web2 applications repeatedly
experience data breaches. There are even websites dedicated to keeping up with these breaches and telling you
when your data has been compromised. You don’t have any control over your data or how it is stored. In fact,
companies often track and save user data without their users' consent.

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Web3 enhances the internet as we know it today with a few other added characteristics. Web3 is the name some
technologists have given to the idea of a new kind of internet service that is built using decentralized blockchains
— the shared ledger systems used by cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Web3 applications either run on blockchains, decentralized networks of many peer-to-peer nodes (servers), or
a combination of the two that forms a crypto economic protocol. These apps are often referred to as DAPPS
(decentralized apps), and you will see that term used often in the web3 space. To achieve a stable and secure
decentralized network, network participants (developers) are incentivized and compete to provide the highest
quality services to anyone using the service.

Core ideas of Web 3

➢ Web3 is decentralized: instead of large swathes of the internet controlled and owned by centralized
entities, ownership gets distributed amongst its builders and users.
➢ Web3 is permissionless: everyone has equal access to participate in Web3, and no one gets
excluded.
➢ Web3 has native payments: it uses cryptocurrency for spending and sending money online
instead of relying on the outdated infrastructure of banks and payment processors.
➢ Web3 cannot be trusted: it operates using incentives and economic mechanisms instead of
relying on trusted third-parties.
A Decentralized Ecosystem
While decentralization is a key tenet of Web3, critics point out that some centralization is unavoidable. Web3
is a cryptographic terminology used to describe a decentralized version of the Internet that will run on public
blockchains like Ethereum. Web3 may reduce the power of the biggest Internet companies — Amazon, Google,
Microsoft and Facebook. Web3’s goal of a decentralized and democratic Internet is a noble one, but as
governments around the world impose restrictions on the Internet, this can be a daunting task. Having made
astronomical profits, Web3 has become an undeniable idealistic crusade on how blockchain technologies will
rebuild the centralized web.

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 Fig: Pros and Cons of Web3.0
Pros
➢ It is expected to be more reliable - Web 3.0 will give more freedom to creators and users in general.
With the help of decentralized networks, Web 3.0 will ensure its users always remain in control of their
online data. The next version of the internet is also expected to be more reliable as its decentralized
nature removes the occurrence of a single-point failure
➢ It will be truly for any and every one - Web 3.0 does not require a single entity to control it. Bigger
corporations may no longer control any aspect of the internet. As a result, decentralized apps or dApps
cannot be censored, and neither can their access be restricted.
➢ Increased personalization of the internet - Since Web 3.0 will be able to understand your
preferences, you will be able to extensively personalize your web browsing experience. This will also
help you surf the web in a productive way.
➢ Web 3.0 will help sellers to market better - With the help of the artificial intelligence of Web 3.0,
sellers can understand your buying needs and show you products and services that you are keen on
purchasing. This helps you see better and more relatable advertisements that have a higher chance of
being beneficial for you.
➢ Uninterrupted services - The decentralization will mean every data will be stored on distributed
nodes and therefore, users need not worry about suspension of a particular account or service
disruptions due to technical or other reasons.
➢ Efficient searching and information linking - In Web3, you will be able to search for information
more efficiently. When you will search for something on a search engine, it will show you more
relevant search results instead of showing you the most popular pages that people click. The semantic
web will help in better connectivity of online data. It will help you by saving more time while searching
for information and be more productive.

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Cons
➢ Ownership concerns - Twitter's former CEO Jack Dorsey believes that regular users will not be the
owners of Web 3.0 projects, as is expected. It will be owned by venture capitalists and investors. This
will mean the control could still remain centralized.
➢ Tough to regulate - Some experts also believe that decentralization could add to difficulties in
monitoring and regulating Web 3.0. This could lead to a rise in cybercrimes, online abuse etc.
➢ Surfing Web 3.0 will require better processors - Old devices will not be able to handle Web 3.0.
Hence, you would require a device that has above-average specifications to be able to use the next
version of the internet.
➢ Existing website owners will be compelled to upgrade - As websites and apps that work on Web 3.0
become popular, existing businesses will be compelled to upgrade their digital offerings to ensure that
they do not lose their captured market.
➢ Easier access to one’s personal and public data - Web 3.0 is vast and interconnected. Though this is
its strength, the semantic network also makes it easy for anybody to gain access to your public and
private information that you share online.
➢ Under preparedness - We are currently not prepared for Web 3.0. A large amount of information
sharing is required, both for organizations and their workforces, and for users to fully understand the
concepts of Web 3.0 and how to make the most out of the opportunities it provides.

NFT
NFT stands for non-fungible token, which is a form of cryptocurrency that is unlike any other. It is a
digital certificate of asset possession. A cricket match ticket, for example, denotes possession of one seat
at the game. NFTs are cryptographic assets on the blockchain with specific identification codes and
metadata that differentiate them from one another, according to Investopedia. NTFs may be used to
describe ownership of artwork, buildings, collections, and everything else that is unique. Since an NFT is
transparent and stored on the blockchain, it is easy for anyone to see who owns the token.

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 Fig: NFT Use cases

What Makes NFT Unique?

NFTs are non-fungible, which means they are one-of-a-kind. For example, your cell phones, laptops,
PlayStation 5, makeup kit, and everything else in your environment that has the same value to anyone and
can be easily replaced are fungible. NFTs are items that only exist in digital form and can be purchased
and owned. Artwork is a good example of anything that cannot be replaced.

How Do NFTs Function?

NFTs, as previously said, are digital certificates that can be purchased or sold just like any other valued
object. When you purchase an NFT, you will receive a certificate that is protected by Blockchain
Technology and identifies you as the owner of that digital asset. Without requesting permission, anyone

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can build, buy, and sell an NFT. Cybercriminals would have a hard time hacking or tampering with these
properties since they are kept in an encrypted peer-to-peer network.

Are NFTs Similar to Bitcoin?

While both NFTs and Bitcoin are considered cryptocurrencies, NFTs differs in that it cannot be used as a
tool for commercial transactions directly. Bitcoin is fungible, meaning that it can be sold or substituted
for other currencies. The value of one bitcoin, for example, is equal to the value of another bitcoin. This
is not the case with NFTs, however. Even if they are on the same platform or in the same set, two NFTs
are never identical. Consider it a one-of-a-kind collectible card that can only be held by one person at any
given time.
What Is the Future of NFTs?

NFT is a relatively new concept in India, and experts say it will take some time for this trend to gain
traction. “India has lakhs of traditional artisans who could profit from using NFTs to check their original
work,” Rahul Pagidipati, CEO of ZebPay. Add to that the growing number of digital media artists who
can cover their work with a tokenized "wrapper" to demonstrate that it is an original work. NFTs will gain
popularity over time as more mainstream artists become aware of the unique cryptocurrency.

What Are Some of the Most Expensive NFTs?

➢ CGI artist Mike Inkelmann sold 21 of his works for 3.5 million dollars.
➢ Rick and Morty images were sold for 2.3 million dollars.
➢ Popular blockchain game Axie was sold for 1.5 million dollars
➢ NFT representing character of CryptoPunks were sold for 7,50,000 dollars

Metaverse
Metaverse is a 3D virtual world that uses technologies like Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR)
to facilitate various forms of social interactions. Users can interact, socialize, hold meetings, buy assets,
attend concerts, and even play games! The possibilities are endless, and you are only limited by your
imagination.
Metaverse adoption has slowed down in 2022, but investors’ and developers’ enthusiasm remains. Recognized
as one of the most turbulent years for the cryptocurrency and blockchain industry, 2022 has still been
vigorous for the metaverse. With over $120 billion invested in the first half of the year alone, according to a
McKinsey report, the industry is anything but broken
The term originated from the influential 1992 science fiction “Snow Crash”. Author Neal Stephenson coined
metaverse as a portmanteau of the Greek word “Meta”, meaning higher or beyond, and “Universe”.
Metaverse was originally envisioned as a fully immersive 3-D virtual space where people can work, play, and
socialize.

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Advantages of Metaverse
The metaverse provides tremendous opportunities:
➢ More collaborative workplaces and shrinking geographical boundaries
➢ More accessible education for all
➢ Mobility for the physically disabled
➢ Unbelievably detailed training - Everything from human anatomy to the internals of a jet engine
can be taught to students
➢ Reduced Need for Travel - Lesser pollution, lesser accidents, less traffic, lower global warming.
For example, conducting military training activities like Pilot training in the metaverse will help
lower the emissions owed to these exercises.
➢ Tremendous potential for advertising and branding
➢ Redefine the gaming industry
➢ Exchange of digital assets and digital economy

A large number of companies are believed to be working on the metaverse. Some of the notable names
include:
➢ Meta (Facebook) - Facebook has already changed its name to Meta with ambitions to transform
routine living from building 3D workrooms, and virtual offices to building AR headsets. It is working
on Horizon workrooms where people will get a chance to meet in the virtual workrooms.
➢ Apple - Apple CEO Tim Cook mentioned that Apple is looking at the tremendous potential of the
metaverse and is “investing accordingly”. The company has 14,000 AR apps on its app store, and
suggestions indicate this number is expected to rise further with more investment.
➢ Nvidia - Nvidia is accelerating the metaverse adoption by providing the Omniverse software for free
to artists and other creators building virtual worlds for the metaverse.
➢ Microsoft - Microsoft is developing a series of Metaverse applications on top of the Mesh platform.
Mesh is a virtual collaboration space for Teams, which will allow employees to use online avatars to
interact and engage with each other during meetings.
➢ Epic Games - Epic Games announced a 1 billion dollar funding for its long-term vision for the
metaverse, with the purpose of filling the world with emotion through the power of creativity and
technology.
➢ Decentraland - Decentraland is a 3D virtual world browser-based platform. Users may buy virtual
plots of land on the platform as NFTs via the MANA cryptocurrency, which uses the Ethereum
blockchain. It is helping users to create as well as monetize different apps and content while
purchasing virtual pieces of land in Metaverse Technology. It dominates the real estate sector and has
seen incredible growth. The virtual real estate market followed crypto's gloomy trends this year. Land
sales decreased 85% in August, from $1 billion in November 2021 to $157 million in August.
➢ Compared to the real estate market, this metaverse section's prospects are good despite this year's
dismal results. Blockchain-based virtual land values have surged 879% since 2019, whereas physical
real estate prices only grew 39%, according to Chainalysis.

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 ➢ Roblox - Roblox’s vision for the metaverse is to create a platform for immersive co- experiences,
where people can come together within millions of 3D experiences to learn, work, play, create, and
socialize. Fostering a rich community built on shared experiences is central to this vision and a driving
force for Roblox’s path forward.

Some major industry trends of 2022:

Two digital cultures: The Sandbox and Decentraland dominate blockchain-based marketplaces in 2022,
widening the gap between centralised and decentralised metaverse platforms. Yet, Meta and Microsoft's desire
to create private digital universes further distanced the two digital cultures.
Immersive technology and the internet connect the metaverse, regardless of digital culture. Gartner expects
broad acceptance and technology maturity in 2030, calling all current advancements "pre-metaverse."
Financial firms: In 2022, major financial institutions partnered with powerful metaverse platforms to expand
their presence. After calling the metaverse a $1-trillion market opportunity, JP Morgan became the first large
bank to build a virtual lounge in Decentraland in February.
HSBC bank and blockchain-based game platform The Sandbox announced a partnership in March to give
their worldwide virtual communities more entertainment, gaming, and user-generated content opportunities.
In April, Standard Chartered partnered with The Sandbox to offer clients creative and innovative
experiences. Journey, an innovation and design business, and Nasdaq rang the first metaverse opening bell in
June to commemorate the debut of a new metaverse studio and endorse the sector.
Luxurious Brands: Gucci, Louis Vuitton, and Burberry joined the metaverse, leading the luxury sector. In
March, Decentraland hosted the first metaverse Fashion Week
Cultural activities: In 2022, live concerts, festivals, and art events drew young people interested in the
metaverse. The metaverse revolves around nonfungible token (NFT) collections and exhibitions, while live
concerts provide entertainment. In November 2022, Ozzy Osbourne played in the metaverse, and Coachella
used AR, video games, and NFTs for both physical and virtual attendees.

Artificial Intelligence
In computer science, the term artificial intelligence (AI) refers to any human-like intelligence exhibited by a
computer, robot, or other machine.

Artificial intelligence, machine learning, and deep learning:

The easiest way to understand the relationship between artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and
deep learning is as follows:

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 ➢ Think of artificial intelligence as the entire universe of computing technology that exhibits
anything remotely resembling human intelligence.
➢ Machine learning is a subset of AI applications that learns by itself. It actually reprograms itself,
as it digests more data, to perform the specific task it's designed to perform with increasingly
greater accuracy.
➢ Deep learning is a subset of machine learning applications that teaches itself to perform a specific
task with increasingly greater accuracy, without human intervention.

Fig: Where exactly does AI lie

Types of artificial intelligence:

➢ Weak AI: Also called Narrow AI or Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI)—it is AI trained
and focused to perform specific tasks.
➢ Strong AI: Also called Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), it is AI that more fully
replicates the autonomy of the human brain—AI that can solve many types or classes of
problems and even choose the problems it wants to solve without human intervention.

Artificial intelligence applications:

Artificial intelligence has made its way into a number of areas. Here are six examples.

➢ AI in healthcare: The biggest bets are on improving patient outcomes and reducing costs. Companies
are applying machine learning to make better and faster diagnoses than humans. One of the best-
known healthcare technologies is IBM Watson. It understands natural language and is capable of

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 responding to questions asked of it. The system mines patient data and other available data sources to
form a hypothesis, which it then presents with a confidence scoring schema.
➢ AI in business: Robotic process automation is being applied to highly repetitive tasks normally
performed by humans. Machine learning algorithms are being integrated into analytics and CRM
platforms to uncover information on how to better serve customers.
➢ AI in education: AI can automate grading, giving educators more time. AI can assess students and
adapt to their needs, helping them work at their own pace.
➢ AI in finance: AI in personal finance applications, such as Mint or Turbo Tax, is disrupting financial
institutions. Applications such as these collect personal data and provide financial advice. Today,
software performs much of the trading on Wall Street.
➢ AI in manufacturing: This is an area that has been at the forefront of incorporating robots into the
workflow. Industrial robots used to perform single tasks and were separated from human workers, but
as the technology advanced that changed.

AI – Recent Applications

Necessity is the biggest driver of (re)invention. The Covid-19 pandemic has dramatically accelerated corporate
digital transformation. Companies have developed new digital capabilities backed by Artificial Intelligence, in
an effort to build resilience and retool for the post-pandemic world.

Edge AI transplants brains to factory tools and machinery

The next wave of artificial intelligence is called “edge AI” or “AI on the edge”. It is a network
infrastructure that makes it possible for AI algorithms to run on the edge of a network. This means, it is
closer to or even on the devices which acquire the data. The sudden and drastic changes in network traffic
that have accompanied Covid-19 lockdowns and the transition to working from home would potentially
accelerate the move towards edge computing.
Some of the advantages of edge computing include saving bandwidth and improving efficiency by
processing information closer to the users and the devices that require it, rather than sending that data to
be processed in central locations in a virtual cloud. When AI is locally embedded, manufacturers can
reduce latency issues and enhance the generation of insights while lowering cloud service utilization and
the costs. Connectivity cost also decreases, as processing part of the data locally lowers bandwidth and
cellular data usage. Since intelligence is run locally, plants located in remote areas with poor
communication infrastructure are less subject to connectivity losses that can hinder mission-critical and
time-sensitive decision making.
Edge AI “steals” a portion of the intelligence from the cloud infrastructure and brings it to machinery.
Octonion is a start-up that integrates artificial intelligence into low-power microcontrollers, exemplifies how
intelligence can be imbued into industrial products. This technology supports companies while making smart
decisions in real time, locally, by using continuous learning models and machine health scores. Few examples
include deploying edge AI on industrial pumps and motors in order to improve monitoring of machine
capabilities and also while developing predictive maintenance techniques.

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Automated and explainable AI makes financial organizations smarter

Banking and Non-Banking Financial Companies expect an 86% increase in investments in AI by the year
2025. User-friendly AI platforms that enable business employees to build models that are easy to
understand and confidently deliver the output are essential in the large-scale deployment of AI. An
example of a fully-automated AI platform is DreamQuark’s Brain for the sales and customer engagement
teams in the financial sector. Deep-learning algorithms have been incorporated while building the
application and it also is effective in determining more than 40% of the credit fraudsters. Customer
transaction data assessment along with their preferences for different products like pensions, retirement
and savings insurance schemes can be examined and analysed using the application.

Health data is gold

Healthcare sector’s big data market is expected to be at nearly $70 billion by the year 2025. This rapid
acceleration of health data acquisition gives the industry an unprecedented opportunity to leverage and
deploy ground-breaking AI capabilities. Patient care also sees potential improvement with smarter use of
health data. In association with Bain’s product and experience innovation team, a leading European
distributor of medical supplies and services has applied AI―including machine learning―to the
treatment of hard-to-heal wounds by developing a mobile application for healthcare professionals. The
app is approved and used as a medical device. It utilizes image recognition to identify a wound and check
whether it is infected or inflamed. Its use has led to a substantial reduction in unnecessary antibiotics and
also minimizes the healing time of hard-to- heal wounds from several years to just a few months.

ChatGPT

ChatGPT, the text-generating AI chatbot developed by OpenAI, has taken the world by storm. With the power
to pass legal exams, write entire feature-length articles, and even code full websites, ChatGPT has people talking
about the power of AI. ChatGPT is a versatile tool that can be utilized for a multitude of tasks, ranging from
basic search queries to advanced algorithmic debugging, making it a simple online artificial intelligence chatbot
where you can ask a question, and it will provide an answer. The current version of ChatGPT (GPT-4) is built
on top of OpenAI's GPT-3.5 and has been fine-tuned (an approach to transfer learning) using both supervised
and reinforcement learning techniques. This has made it much more powerful than before and has enabled it to
exhibit human-level performance on various professional and academic benchmarks. The benchmarks set by
the latest version are just phenomenal and are only set to grow exponentially.

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Performance report

Fig: ChatGPT exam results

Advantages of ChatGPT

As Chat GPT is a pre-trained generative transformer chatbot there are several advantages to it, let’s have a look
at the pros of this AI-

➢ Versatility: ChatGPT can be used for a wide range of tasks, from basic search queries to complex
problem-solving.
➢ Efficiency: ChatGPT is a quick and efficient way to get answers to questions and find information.
➢ Accuracy: ChatGPT has been fine-tuned to exhibit human-level performance on various professional
and academic benchmarks, making it a highly accurate tool.
➢ Accessibility: ChatGPT is available online, making it easily accessible to anyone with an internet
connection.
➢ Cost-effective: ChatGPT can be used for free, making it a cost-effective solution for businesses and
individuals alike.
➢ Scalability: ChatGPT can be scaled to meet the needs of any organization, from small startups to large
enterprises.
➢ Innovation: ChatGPT is at the forefront of artificial intelligence technology, with new advancements
being made all the time, which helps to push the boundaries of what is possible.

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Limitations of ChatGPT

Despite ChatGPT’s advanced capabilities, ChatGPT is not without limitations. As with any AI technology,
ChatGPT has certain weaknesses and challenges that can impact its performance and accuracy.

➢ Lack of common sense: While ChatGPT can generate human-like responses and has access to a large
amount of information, it does not possess human-level common sense — and the model also lacks the
background knowledge we have. This means that ChatGPT may sometimes provide nonsensical or
inaccurate responses to certain questions or situations
➢ Lack of emotional intelligence: While ChatGPT can generate responses that seem empathetic, it does
not possess true emotional intelligence. It cannot detect subtle emotional cues or respond appropriately
to complex emotional situations.
➢ Limitations in understanding context: ChatGPT has difficulty understanding context, especially
sarcasm and humour. While ChatGPT is proficient in language processing, it can struggle to grasp the
subtle nuances of human communication. For example, if a user were to use sarcasm or humour in their
message, ChatGPT may fail to pick up on the intended meaning and instead provide a response that is
inappropriate or irrelevant.
➢ Computational costs and power: ChatGPT is a highly complex and sophisticated AI language model
that requires substantial computational resources to operate efficiently — which means running the
model can be expensive and may require access to specialized hardware and software systems.
Additionally, running ChatGPT on low-end hardware or systems with limited computational power can
result in slower processing times, reduced accuracy, and other performance issues. Organizations should
carefully consider their computational resources and capabilities before using ChatGPT.

The Potentially Large Effects of Artificial Intelligence on Economic Growth

ChatGPT, only a few months old, is already causing waves in the business world, and if generative AI delivers
on its promised capabilities, it could lead to significant disruption in the labour market. According to Goldman
Sachs's analysts, using data on occupational tasks in both the US and Europe, roughly two-thirds of current jobs
are exposed to some degree of AI automation, and generative AI could substitute up to one-fourth of current
work. Extrapolating these estimates globally suggests that generative AI could expose the equivalent of 300mn
full-time jobs to automation.

Here are few jobs that ChatGPT could potentially replace:

Tech Jobs: Tech jobs such as software developers, web developers, computer programmers, coders, and data
scientists are “pretty amenable” to AI technologies “displacing more of their work.”

Media jobs: Media jobs across the board — including those in advertising, technical writing, journalism, and
any role that involves content creation — may be affected by ChatGPT and similar forms of AI. This is majorly
because AI is able to read, write, and understand text-based data well.
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Market Research Analysis: AI is good at analysing data and predicting outcomes and this is the reason why
market research analysts may be susceptible to AI-driven change.

Customer service agents: You've probably already experienced calling or chatting with a company's customer
service, and having a robot answer. ChatGPT and related technologies could continue this trend. A 2022 study
from the tech research company Gartner predicted that chatbots will be the main customer service channel for
roughly 25% of companies by 2027.

Competitors

The AI powered natural language processing (NLP) tools are having immense possibilities in the near future.
Naturally, the competition is intense in the world of ChatGPT.

There are a number of promising competitors in the AI LLM (Large Language Models) space. They are

➢ Amazon’s new language model: Amazon is another big player in the generative AI market place. It has
launched a new language model which is significantly more efficient than GPT3.5.
➢ Google Bard (LaMDA): As per Google, “The architecture based on a self-attention mechanism that
we believe to be particularly well suited for language understanding”. LaMDA has been trained with
more than 1.56 trillion words and 137 billion parameters. It takes natural language as an input to generate
a meaningful response.
➢ Microsoft Bing AI: AI powered Microsoft Bing has been launched in February 2023. This AI tool with
the Edge browser will help us to get better search result and generate content. These tools have been
named as ‘AI co-pilot for the web’.

GPT-4

GPT-4 is a large language model (LLM) created by OpenAI that was released in March 2023. It is the successor
to GPT-3, which was released in 2020. GPT-4 is trained on a massive dataset of text and code, and it can generate
text, translate languages, write different kinds of creative content, and answer your questions in an informative
way.

GPT-4 is unique in a number of ways. First, it is much larger than GPT-3. GPT-4 has 175 billion parameters,
while GPT-3 has 117 billion parameters. This means that GPT-4 is able to learn more complex patterns in the
data, and it is able to generate more realistic and creative text.

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Second, GPT-4 is multimodal. This means that it can take both text and images as input. This allows GPT-4 to
generate text that is more relevant to the context of the image. For example, if you give GPT-4 an image of a
cat, it can generate text about cats, such as "cats are furry animals that are often kept as pets."

Third, GPT-4 is more reliable than GPT-3. GPT-4 is less likely to generate text that is factually incorrect or
offensive. This is because GPT-4 is trained on a dataset that is more representative of the real world.

GPT-4 has a wide range of potential use cases. It can be used to generate text for a variety of purposes, such as
writing articles, blog posts, and product descriptions. It can also be used to translate languages, write different
kinds of creative content, and answer your questions in an informative way.

References: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPT-4

Project Management
What is a Project Manager?

➢ A project manager is the point person for all of the company’s major goals by implementing important
plans and managing teams.
➢ They follow a project from ideation to completion.
➢ Project managers are involved in the planning, executing, monitoring, controlling implementing,
and maintaining ongoing support work for company-wide undertakings.
➢ They act as important mediators between teams when something is going wrong or there’s a
communication breakdown

What exactly is the role of a Project Manager?

A project manager’s role is to ensure that projects are completed on time, within budget, and according to
the project requirements. Project managers oversee the project team, assign tasks, and ensure that everyone
is working towards the same goal.

Some of the specific tasks that a project manager may be responsible for include:

➢ Defining project objectives and scope

➢ Developing project plans and schedules
➢ Identifying project risks and developing risk management plans
➢ Managing project budgets and resource allocation
➢ Monitoring project progress and tracking project deliverables
➢ Communicating project status to stakeholders
➢ Managing project changes and scope creep
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 ➢ Facilitating project meetings and collaboration among team members
➢ Ensuring project quality and customer satisfaction
➢ Closing out the project and conducting a project evaluation.

What does a Project Manager’s workday look like?

A project manager's workday can vary depending on the stage of the project and the specific needs of the project
team. However, some common activities that a project manager may engage in during their workday include:

➢ Reviewing project status: Project managers often start their day by reviewing project status reports
and checking on progress against the project plan. This helps them identify any potential roadblocks and
take action to address them.
➢ Communicating with stakeholders: Project managers spend a significant amount of time
communicating with project stakeholders, including team members, customers, and sponsors. They may
send emails, make phone calls, or schedule meetings to discuss project updates, address concerns, and
gather feedback.
➢ Managing team tasks: Project managers are responsible for assigning tasks to team members,
monitoring progress, and ensuring that everyone is working towards the project objectives. They may
check in with team members individually or hold team meetings to review progress and discuss any
issues or challenges.
➢ Conducting project planning: Project managers are responsible for developing project plans and
schedules, so they may spend time reviewing and updating project plans as needed. They may also work
on developing risk management plans and identifying potential project risks.
➢ Handling administrative tasks: Project managers also handle administrative tasks such as
documenting project progress, updating project plans and schedules, and preparing reports for
stakeholders. They may also manage project budgets and handle procurement tasks such as ordering
equipment or supplies.
➢ Conducting project evaluations: As the project nears completion, project managers may spend time
conducting project evaluations to assess project success and identify areas for improvement.

Some Project Management Tools and Frameworks

A project manager can use multiple project management tools based on their needs or at what stage their
company is. Some of the most popular project management tools, which will help a project manager complete
their tasks efficiently include:

➢ Microsoft Project: A project management software program that helps project managers develop
project plans, assign tasks, and track project progress.
➢ Trello: A web-based project management tool that uses boards, lists, and cards to help teams organize
and prioritize tasks.
➢ Asana: A project management tool that allows teams to track tasks, assign work, and communicate
about project progress.
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 ➢ Basecamp: A web-based project management tool that offers features such as task lists, messaging, and
file sharing to help teams collaborate on projects.
➢ Jira: A software development project management tool that allows teams to track bugs, issues, and
feature requests.
➢ Smartsheet: A cloud-based project management tool that provides project scheduling, task tracking,
and team collaboration features.
➢ Wrike: A project management tool that offers task management, collaboration, and reporting features
to help teams manage projects more effectively.
➢ Monday.com: A web-based project management tool that offers features such as customizable
workflows, visual timelines, and task tracking.

Now, moving on to project management frameworks. These are structured approaches that provide
guidelines, processes, and best practices for managing projects. They help project managers to deliver projects
within scope, on time, and within budget. Here are some of the popular project management frameworks:

➢ Agile: A flexible and iterative project management framework that emphasizes collaboration,
continuous improvement, and rapid delivery of working software.
➢ Waterfall: A traditional project management framework that follows a linear sequential approach,
where each stage of the project must be completed before the next one can begin.
➢ Scrum: An Agile framework that is used for managing complex software development projects. It
emphasizes teamwork, iterative progress, and continuous feedback.
➢ Kanban: A visual project management framework that helps teams to manage workflow by limiting
work in progress, visualizing work, and maximizing efficiency.
➢ PRINCE2: A process-based project management framework that emphasizes project planning, risk
management, and continuous business justification.
➢ PMBOK: The Project Management Body of Knowledge is a standard developed by the Project
Management Institute (PMI). It provides a set of best practices and guidelines for managing projects
across various industries.
➢ Lean Six Sigma: A methodology that combines Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma principles to
improve quality, eliminate waste, and reduce variability in project management.

Recap

Now, let’s have a quick recap of what we learned!

➢ A project manager is responsible for ensuring that projects are completed within the given timeframe
and budget, and according to requirements.
➢ They define project objectives and scope, develop project plans, monitor progress, communicate with
stakeholders, manage team tasks, and conduct project evaluations.
➢ There are many project management tools available, including Microsoft Project, Trello, Asana,
Basecamp, Jira, Smartsheet, Wrike, and Monday.com.

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 ➢ Project management frameworks provide guidelines, processes, and best practices for managing
projects, such as Agile, Waterfall, Scrum, Kanban, PRINCE2, PMBOK, and Lean Six Sigma.

Resources

➢ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/business/software/what-is-a-project-manager/
➢ https://pmbasics101.com/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-project-manager/
➢ https://asana.com/resources/best-project-management-software
➢ https://asana.com/resources/project-management-methodologies

Product Management

What is Product Management?

Product management is the business process of planning, developing, launching, and managing a product or
service. It includes the entire lifecycle of a product, from ideation to development to product launch. It is often
seen as a point of intersection of multiple functions, such as User Interface/ User Experience (UI/UX),
Technological aspects and Business aspects.

Fig: Where exactly does Product Management lie?

What is the role of a Product Manager?

➢ A Product Manager (PM) takes holistic responsibility for the product, from the little details to the
big picture.
➢ A PM needs to set vision and strategy and finally define success and make decisions. It is a highly
collaborative role.
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 ➢ A PM usually serves as the main liaison between the engineering and other roles such as design,
quality assurance, user research, data analysts, marketing, sales, customer support, business
development, legal, content writers, other engineering teams, and the executive team.
➢ It is usually the job of the PM to identify times when one of these teams should be brought in, and
to fill in for them if they don’t exist.

Fig: Role of a Product Manager

“Embrace the journey, do not fret about the destination. This applies not only to life, but also to
Product Management. Embrace the process, never skip a step, and you will arrive at your solution.
Never look for solutions first, a planned approach backed by structured thinking is more important!”

What does a PM’s workday look like?

The day-to-day work of a product manager varies over the course of the product life cycle. In the beginning,
they will be figuring out what to build; in the middle, they help the team to make progress; at the end they
prepare for the launch of the product.

While the product life cycle varies by company (and sometimes even by team), it usually follows a
general pattern of Product Framing (Problem identification) Research & Planning, Designing the solution,
Implementing the pilot version, Launching the product (or a feature) and Measuring its success.

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Fig: Different types of PMs

Fig: Product Management Lifecycle

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What are some frameworks that are useful in Product Management?

Product Management is not a straight-forward, definitive process. Knowledge about the domain and
expertise in the domain can be achieved only through regular practice. Having said that, there is no
single framework that always serves as the solution to a given problem. One has to carefully assess the
scope of the problem, the plan of action and the issues that need to be addressed, and only then, apply a
suitable framework which will enable them to solve the given problem.

Here are some common frameworks that are used to solve Product Management problems. Read more
about these using the links provided in the resources section.

➢ CIRCLES framework for Product Design

➢ AARRR framework for Success Metrics
➢ HEART framework for UX Design
➢ RICE framework for prioritization
➢ 4 QUADRANT MATRIX framework for time management/ criticality
➢ REAN framework for Digital Marketing Strategies
➢ AIDA framework for channel and communication optimization, etc.

Let’s crack this case!

Alright, having covered the basics of Product Management, let us look at a sample case which uses the
CIRCLES framework for product design and the steps to be followed to solve the given problem.

Fig: CIRCLES framework

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 Note: There are no definitive RIGHTS and WRONGS, and there might be multiple solutions to a
single problem. As long as your approach is well thought out and structured and your solution is
feasible, apt and scalable, you are good to go!

Case Problem: Design a theme park app to ease the customer’s ticket booking process and to ensure
a hassle-free experience.

Let’s apply the CIRCLES method, since this is a product design problem. Along the way, you will find
certain tips and guidelines too! Happy case-cracking!

➢ C - Comprehend the problem: Try to comprehend the problem thoroughly. Ask as many
clarifying questions as you want. Take a minute and jot down your thoughts. Understand the
company and industry situation, competitor landscape, costs and budgets, values of the company,
etc. State any assumptions that you want to make clearly. After following these steps, we can
comprehend the given problem as:
o App for normal conditions (No lockdowns, etc.) in tier 1 cities in India
o It is a well-known amusement park in the industry, there are not many competitors
o There are no issues in budgeting, they have sufficient funds
o Purpose is to increase the user base and thereby increase revenue

➢ I – Identify the customer segment: Try to list all segments initially, consider their age brackets,
lifestyle, income, inclination, location, tastes and preferences. Understand their goals or
expectations. Clarify with the interviewer if you are stuck. Based on the above criteria, come up
with a target segment and provide your rationale for choosing the same.
o Kids, teenagers, millennials/ GenZ (young adults) and parents are the various
segments available
o Considering propensity to pay, exposure to technology and apps, tastes and
preferences, we can narrow down to young adults and parents as target audience
(customers) for the app

➢ R – Report the customer’s needs: Put yourself in the shoes of the customer and identify their
needs to be addressed. Come up with lucid user stories and user personas (semi-fictional user
characters, if needed). Here’s an example of a user story:
“As a [type of user], I want/need to [perform an action] so that [the intended result].”
o To avoid lengthy queues
o To enable bulk ticket booking, and booking many days in advance
o To notify when tickets are booking fast (seasonal)
o To ensure hassle-free payments
o To get combo packs/ free coupons based on previous history of booking

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 o To prebook meals
o To get photos clicked in the theme park through the app

➢ C – Cut through prioritization: Prioritize the most crucial consumer needs from the ones listed
in the previous steps. Ask the interviewer the key criteria using which these needs can be
prioritized. If you are provided with the liberty of choosing your own set of criteria, you may
evaluate the needs on the basis of regularity, monetary aspects, market size, population, app usage
statistics, etc. Use relevant facts or guesstimates to make an informed decision. Show your work
to the interviewers and clarify at each step. The prioritized needs for the given scenario after
following the above steps are listed below. The other needs can be planned at a later stage,
depending on the product’s progress.
o To avoid lengthy queues
o To enable bulk ticket booking, and booking many days in advance
o To notify when tickets are booking fast (seasonal)
o To ensure hassle-free payments

➢ L – List the solutions: Map out the user journey. Make your solutions customer-focused. List out
the features as per pain points in the user journey. Describe the solutions provided. Give an
approximate and feasible timeframe to achieve the proposed solutions. After following the given
steps, some solutions are:

o Ride-wise sections on the app and their details (Price, Age group, Instructions and
warnings, Time slots available, etc.), so that booking can be easily done
o Dynamic pricing, since theme parks are a seasonal business (Demand is not constant
throughout the year)
o Connection to robust databases and servers (To accommodate for bulk ticket
booking, especially during holiday season) to ensure that the app does not slow down.
Slow response times could affect customer satisfaction levels
o Connection to reliable, high-speed and efficient payment gateways
o Once the ticket is booked, QR code can be sent on the app and the user needs to scan
the code at the park’s entry and for the rides booked.

➢ E –Evaluate trade-offs: Try to deduce the potential issues that could arise due to the proposed
solutions and account for their handling and optimization (Exception Handling). Some possible
trade-offs in this scenario are:

o Users might forget the age / height / weight criteria for certain rides (although they
saw it on the app while booking, they might also forget to look for the instruction
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 board near the rides). Hence, once the QR code for a ride is scanned by the user, a
pop-up mentioning the instructions, criteria and warnings must be displayed
o Measures should be taken for payment issues (prompt redressal and reimbursement
processes must be in place)

➢ S – Summarize your recommendations and define Success Metrics: Wrap up by summarizing

salient points and the overall flow. Define certain metrics through which the success of the
solutions proposed can be measured. Some success metrics for the given scenario are:
o New users or number of new app installs
o Active user base
o Referrals or recommendations
o App churn rate or accounts deactivated
o Play Store and App Store ratings and reviews
o Reviews and comments on social media handles
o Frequency of app use, etc.

There you go! Together, we CRACKED it! But remember, Rome was not built in a day. You will need
a lot of practice to crack different types of PM problems. Listed in the end of this section are some
resources that will help you get started. Happy learning!

Here’s a quick recap of what we have learned so far!

➢ Introduction to Product Management
➢ Role of a Product Manager
➢ Various frameworks that can be used to solve PM problems
➢ A sample product design case using the CIRCLES framework

Resources:

➢ https://employees.cityofsanrafael.org/product-management-how-it-works/
➢ https://davidolszewski.com/top-16-frameworks-every-product-manager-wants-to-know
➢ https://getstream.io/blog/circles-method/
➢ https://www.productplan.com/glossary/rice-scoring-model/ https://www.hotjar.com/product-
forge/user-persona-examples/
➢ https://www.youtube.com/@pmschoolx
➢ https://www.youtube.com/@tryexponent
➢ https://www.reforge.com/blog/product-specializations-pt2
➢ https://www.upgrad.com/blog/product-managers-who-changed-the-world/

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Technology Consulting
What is it all about?

As our world rapidly changes, technology consulting is becoming increasingly important to ensure the future
growth of organizations globally. Technology consulting companies help their clients to transform the way they
use technology and create better experiences for their customers. So, basically, they advise on how to improve
a client’s business processes, reduce costs, maximize use of tech opportunities, and more. Technology
Consultants work with clients to help them transform the way they use technology.

What exactly do technology consultants do?

➢ In a nutshell, technology consultants advise businesses on how best to use and implement technology
solutions to meet their business objectives.
➢ Technology consultants take a strategic look on how technology can help improve an organization,
which includes architecting and realizing exceptional value from technology.
➢ A Technology Consultant delivers components of client engagements that identify, design, and
implement technology and creative business solutions for companies.
➢ They help clients in transitioning to technology platforms and train the client teams on using the
technology efficiently to achieve business goals.

Difference between IT consulting and Technology consulting

Technology Consulting IT Consulting

➢ Technology Consulting is operational in ➢ IT Consulting is more often

nature. integration consulting
➢ You map a current process, figure out what's ➢ You build and evaluate systems,
wrong with it, break it, and determine what a and the work is extremely
new process should be. technical in nature

Top Companies in the Technology Consulting business

➢ Accenture Strategy and Technology Consulting

➢ IBM Global Business Services
➢ Deloitte
➢ Gartner
➢ Infosys Consulting
➢ Cognizant Business Solutions
➢ PwC
➢ EY
➢ Capgemini and many more
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Areas of Technology Consulting

Fig: Types of Tech consulting

Typical Job Description of a Technology Consultant

➢ Work as part of a fast-growing practice supporting the business analysis, project management and
program portfolio management.
➢ Work with client counterparts to design and implement business capabilities that harness emerging and
scaled technologies, such as Cloud, Blockchain, AI, Automation, Data and Analytics and Internet of
Things (IoT).
➢ Analyse business processes and transformation, information systems concept, structure architecture and
engineer requirements.
➢ Liaising with clients and stakeholders to determine project requirements.
➢ Improve system efficiency by consulting with end-users and provide innovative solutions.
➢ Develop solutions based on the broad range of technology offerings in line to the client’s need and in
conformance to the technology strategy and assets within the client’s IT landscape.
➢ Using data modelling and analysis to inform and illustrate solutions.
➢ Solving key business problems and challenges by painting a picture of, and charting a journey from the
current state to a “to-be” enterprise environment.
➢ Training end-users on hardware functionality and software programs.

Skills and Competencies required for Technology Consulting

➢ Attention to detail: you need a good eye for spotting mistakes and errors that could have a disastrous
impact. It’s great to view the bigger picture, but technology consulting is all about the small details!

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 ➢ Analytical Skills: You may not be building new systems from the get-go, but you’ll likely be analysing
data that will impact new systems and client decisions. Employers don’t expect you to love number
crunching, but it’s beneficial to have good numerical analytical skills too.
➢ Working under pressure: Technology consulting can lead to time-sensitive situations, especially if a
business needs you to remove a virus or fix an issue with their software, stopping them from running
their business.
➢ Problem solving: A technology consultant needs to identify faults and find a solution to fix it. Clients
may ask you to help find more effective ways of communicating or quicker solutions, so you must keep
up to date with the latest tools to understand how to fix their problem and deal with it professionally.
➢ Verbal and written communication: Technology consultants are the first contact point for clients so
you need effective communication to understand what they need. Technology consulting project
managers need communication skills to liaise with the team to ensure everyone knows their task and
goals.
➢ Ability to multitask: Depending on your employer or client list, technology consultants are busy
people. You must learn to juggle multiple tasks and projects at once because your clients will want
different things after all
➢ Time management: To juggle multiple tasks at once, you need excellent time management skills. Time
management is about prioritizing your time effectively so you can get the work done when it’s needed.
➢ Technically Savvy: This is one of the more obvious skills, but technology consulting isn’t just about
dealing with clients. You must fix the reason they come to you - from repairing computer viruses,
designing new systems to training users with new technology. You need to stay up to date with the latest
technologies and trends so you’re ready for anything!

Career Paths in Technology Consulting

Fig: Career paths in Tech consulting

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References

➢ https://www.brightnetwork.co.uk/career-path-guides/technology-consulting-project-
management/bright-guide-technology-consulting/
➢ https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/technology-consulting
➢ https://www.brightnetwork.co.uk/career-path-guides/technology-consulting-project-
management/technology-consulting-skills-you-need-get-sector/

Analytics
Data analytics is the science of analyzing raw data in order to make conclusions about that information.
Many of the techniques and processes of data analytics have been automated intomechanical processes
and algorithms that work over raw data for human consumption.

Data analytics techniques can reveal trends and metrics that would otherwise be lost in the massof
information. This information can then be used to optimize processes to increase the overall efficiency
of a business or system.

Types of Data Analytics

Since big data is not a new concept for businesses, enterprises are leveraging different types ofdata
analytics tools to excerpt meaningful information from their data. Here are some most relevant types of
data analytics.

➢ Prescriptive Analytics: This data analytics concept prescribes what action to take to remove
future problems or capitalize on a promising trend. Prescriptive analytics essentially provides an
organization with a laser-like focus to answer a specific question. It also helps them to
determine the best solution for a future opportunity or avoid future risks
➢ Predictive analytics: It uses big data to identify past patterns to predict the future. Predictive
analytics draws its power from numerous methods and technologies, such as big data, data
mining, statistical modelling, machine learning and assorted mathematical processes, among
others. By utilizing this model, an organization can use past and current data to reliably forecast
trends and behaviours.
➢ Descriptive analytics: This data analytics method provides insight into what has happened
historically and will provide businesses with trends to get in-depth detail. Descriptive
analytics defines a preliminary stage of data processing that creates a summary of historical
data to yield meaningful information and possibly prepare the data for further analysis.
➢ Diagnostic Analytics: With this analytics technique, historical data can be measured against
other data to answer the question of why something happened. Essentially, data scientists turn to
this technique when trying to determine “Why” behind something happened. Diagnostic
analytics can be beneficial in the sales cycle, for instance, to categorize customers by their likely
product preferences and sales cycle.

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Applications of Data Analytics
The applications of data analytics are broad. Analyzing big data can optimize efficiency in many different
industries. Improving performance enables businesses to succeed in an increasingly competitive world.
One of the earliest adopters is the financial sector. Data analytics has an important role in the banking and
finance industries, used to predict market trends and assess risk.Credit scores are an example of data
analytics that affects everyone. These scores use many data points to determine lending risk. Data analytics
is also used to detect and prevent fraud to improveefficiency and reduce risk for financial institutions.

The use of data analytics goes beyond maximizing profits and ROI, however. Data analytics can
provide critical information for healthcare (health informatics), crime prevention, and
environmental protection. These applications of data analytics use these techniques to improve our
world. Though statistics and data analysis have always been used in scientificresearch, advanced
analytic techniques and big data allow for many new insights. These techniques can find trends in
complex systems.

Data Analytics Tools

➢ R Programming
➢ Tableau
➢ Python
➢ SAS
➢ Excel
➢ SPSS
➢ Power BI

SPSS
SPSS is short for Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, and it’s used by various kinds of
researchers for complex statistical data analysis.

SPSS is used by market researchers, health researchers, survey companies, government entities,
education researchers, marketing organizations, data miners, and many more for the processing and
analyzing of survey data.
SPSS offers four programs that assist researchers with their complex data analysis needs.

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 Statistics Program Basic statistical functions like frequencies, cross
tabulation, and bivariate statistics

Modeler Program Build and validate predictive models using advanced

statistical procedures

Text Analytics for Surveys Program Uncover powerful insights from responses to open
ended survey questions

Visualization Designer Use data to create a wide variety of visuals like density
charts and radial boxplots

Power BI
Microsoft’s Power BI is a cloud-based, business analytics service for analyzing and visualizing data.
Power BI gives you a platform to Connect to hundreds of data sources and bring your datato life with
live dashboards and reports.

Why is Power BI Important?

➢ Telling stories through charts and data visualizations
➢ Examining "what if" scenarios within data
➢ Forecasting to make sure departments meet business metrics
➢ Executive dashboards for managers for insight into departments
➢ Automatic data refresh which provides near-real-time analytics of trends and indicators

Tableau
Tableau is a data visualization software that is used for data science and business intelligence. Itpresents
the impact of data visually and comes with real-time data analytics capabilities and cloud support.

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 Fig: A comparison of Excel and Tableau

Power BI Tableau

Data sources:
It has access to numerous database sources and
Limited access to other databases and servers servers.
when compared to Tableau.
Example:
Example: Excel, Text File, Access, JSON File, PDF File,
Spatial File, Statistical File, Other Files
SQL Server Database, Access Database, SQL (such as Tableau. hyper, .tds and
Server Analysis Services Database, Oracle .twbx)
Database, IBM DB2 Database, IBM Informix
database (Beta) Connect to a Published Data Source on
TableauOnline or Server, Actian Matrix,
ActianVector, Amazon Athena, Amazon

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 Aurora, Amazon EMR, Amazon Redshift

Data Capacity:
Each workspace/group could handle up to 10
GB of Data. Tableau works on the columnar based structure
For more than 10GB, Either Data needs to be which stores only unique values for each
in a cloud (Azure), if it is in local databases column making it possible to fetch Billions of
Power BI just selects or pulls the data from a rows.
database and does not import

Machine Learning:
Power BI is integrated with Microsoft Azure; it
helps in analyzing the data and understanding Python machine learning capacities are inbuilt
the trends and patterns of the product/business. with Tableau, making it efficient for performing
ML operations over the datasets.

Performance:
It can handle a limited volume of data. It can handle a huge volume of data with better
performance.

Target Audience:
Naive Users, Experienced Users Even though access is easy and simple,
Analysts and Experienced users use it for their
analytics purposes.

Pricing: Tableau is costlier than power BI. It needs to be

It is very cheap when compared toTableau paid more when connected to third-party
applications.

Real Time Dashboard: Tableau provides feature for real time data. The
With Power BI real- time streaming, you can Connect Live feature is used for real-timedata
stream data andupdate dashboards in real-time. analysis.
Any visual or dashboard that can be created in
Power BI canalso be created to display and
update real-timedata and visuals.

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Data Analytics and Consulting
What is it all about?

Analytics consultants provide solutions that improve efficiency and solve company issues. They are responsible
for gathering and analysing business data, making improvement suggestions, and increasing revenue levels.
Analytics consultants provide leadership in assisting business development with use of appropriate data assets,
statistical/machine learning techniques and delivery options to meet client information and analyse their needs.

An analytics Consultant's job revolves around the discovery and examination of data and the representation of
the results and conclusions in a way that makes it clear which course of action would benefit the business the
best. Aside from mining and processing data, they are also tasked with predicting what is yet to come, such as
market trends, investment evaluations, and similar factors. They are meant to provide insight and solutions
which only an expert could.

Top Companies in the Analytics business (Inhouse and Consulting)

➢ American Express
➢ Aays Analytics
➢ Tiger Analytics
➢ EXL Services
➢ ZS Associates
➢ Mu Sigma
➢ Fractal Analytics
➢ Latentview Analytics
➢ IDFC Bank
➢ PwC
➢ Capgemini and many more

Typical Job Description of Analytics Role

➢ Understand the specific business problem at hand and analyse relevant data to derive business insights
➢ Manage various data analytics client projects and work with business executives to understand business
constraints that could potentially impact data science or machine learning models
➢ Assess sample data and prepare a preliminary solutions proposal document to present to clients
➢ Strategize data collection methods and create sample sizes, propose new data sources, and advise team
on how to simulate market scenarios to enhance data assets
➢ Translate business insights to implementable solutions such as business strategies/data science/ machine
learning models
➢ Report data results and insights by using business intelligence tools and present the results of predictive
models by converting it to usable business insights
➢ Break down project goals into specific tasks involving business analysis, data analysis and data
engineering. Divide and assign tasks for Business Problem Definition, Data Preparation, Exploratory
Analysis, Model Development and Implementation, Model Validation and Testing, Insights Generation,
Hypothesis Testing and Scenario Analysis, Presentation etc.

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Technical skills desirable for Analytics Roles

Advanced
Excel

Tableau/
Python/ R
Power BI

Tools & Technologies

Alteryx/
SQL
Databricks

AWS/
Azure/ GCP

Fig: Technical skills for an Analyst

Skills and Competencies required for the role of an Analyst:

Here are a few skills that will set you apart in the role of an Analyst.

➢ Proficient in using data modelling, operations research, and statistics to solve real world business
problems such as fraud detection, cross-selling, and dynamic pricing.
➢ Problem Solving: You love problem solving, you have excellent communication skills, and you are
action oriented (you like doing stuff, not just thinking or talking about them).
➢ Love to work with data: You get excited at the prospect of working with large volumes of data and
enjoy coding!
➢ Attention to detail: you need a good eye for spotting mistakes and errors that could have a disastrous
impact. It’s great to view the bigger picture, but analytics consulting is all about the small details!
➢ Working under pressure: Analytics consulting can lead to time-sensitive situations, especially if a
business needs you to remove a virus or fix an issue with their dashboards, stopping them from running
their business.
➢ Open to learn: You are open to learning continuously – irrespective of whether it is a new technology,
a new algorithm or a new business!
➢ Verbal and written communication: Analytics consultants should be able to communicate the insights
effectively and in layman terms to the clients or other stakeholders. Hence, they must have good written
and oral communication skills.
➢ Ability to Integrate with Cross-Functional Business Partners.
➢ Knowledge of SQL, Python, R is a plus.
➢ Knowledge of MS Office – PowerPoint, Excel
➢ High motivation, good work ethic, maturity and personal initiative.

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 Fig: Analytics Roles

Fig: Data Analytics project flow

References

➢ https://www.zippia.com/analytics-consultant-jobs/

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 ➢ https://www.tigeranalytics.com/us-openings-analytics-consultant/

Technology in Finance
Technology in Finance, better known as Financial Technology or FinTech is used to describe new technology
that seeks to improve or automate the delivery and use of financial services. At its core, fintech is utilized to
help companies, business owners, and consumers better manage their financial operations, processes, and lives.
It is composed of specialized software and algorithms that are used on computers and smartphones. FinTech
also includes the development and use of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Onecoin, Dogecoin, etc.

Current Scenario in FinTech in India

The fintech industry in India has been growing rapidly in recent years, driven by a combination of factors
including government initiatives, digital adoption, and changing consumer behaviour. The following are some
of the key trends and developments shaping the current scenario in fintech in the Indian market:

Fig: Current Fintech trends

➢ Wealth Management: Fintech companies are offering robo-advisory services that provide automated
investment advice, making wealth management more affordable and accessible for retail investors.
According to a report by KPMG, the size of the Indian wealth management industry is expected to reach
$2.1 trillion by 2025, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.5%. According to a
report by PwC, the assets under management (AUM) of robo-advisory platforms in India are expected
to grow from $4.4 billion in 2020 to $25 billion in 2025.

➢ Government Initiatives: The Indian government has launched several initiatives to promote digital
payments and financial inclusion, such as the Jan Dhan Yojana scheme and the BharatQR code. These
initiatives have helped increase the adoption of digital financial services.
➢ Regulatory Environment: The Reserve Bank of India has introduced several regulatory frameworks
for fintech companies, such as the regulatory sandbox framework and the Payment and Settlement

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 Systems Act. These frameworks have helped create a more conducive environment for fintech
innovation.
➢ Start-up Ecosystem: India has a thriving start-up ecosystem, with several fintech start-ups receiving
significant funding and investor interest. This has led to the emergence of new business models and
innovative solutions in the fintech space. As of 2021, there are over 2,100 fintech startups in India,
according to a report by MEDICI.

Current Scenario in FinTech Globally

Open Banking: Open banking is gaining traction globally, with regulations such as the Payment
Services Directive 2 (PSD2) in the European Union and the Open Banking Standard in the UK enabling
third-party access to customer data and payment infrastructure. This has led to the emergence of new
business models and innovative solutions in the fintech space.

Future trends in Indian FinTech Ecosystem

➢ Neobank: Hyper personalization of banking products: Over the last few years, the number of neo-
banking platforms and global investments in the neo-banking segment has risen consistently. The Indian
FinTech space has followed suit, and the number of neo-banking startups in the country is growing by
months and attracting global investors to this market. The continuous funding received since 2017
reflects the increased interest in this sector. The funding activity, however, was buoyed by the pandemic.
Investors realized the potential that Neobanks bring to the larger financial services industry.
➢ InsurTech- a new wave of product and distribution innovation: According to S&P Global Market
Intelligence, while InsurTech fundraising has been brisk across Asia in recent years, innovators in China
and India appear best positioned to move beyond a supporting role and confront the region’s industry
incumbents. The Indian InsurTech space has grown considerably over the past few years, with steep
funding growth (more than doubled in the past two years) enabled by innovative business models.
➢ Blockchain: Blockchain is a digital ledger that records and verifies different types of transactions. It
allows individuals, organizations and machines to securely transfer digital assets without relying on any
central authority or third-party intermediary. This decentralization means blockchain technology can be
used for various financial applications, such as payments, transfers and trading. In addition to its security
benefits, blockchain has potential implications for cost savings due to its distributed nature. For
example, reducing the need for costly intermediaries like banks or brokers can drastically reduce the
costs associated with international financial transactions.
➢ Embedded Finance: The term "embedded finance" describes a broad category of financial services and
products that may be used within a certain framework or platform. Users can better manage their finances
without switching between several apps or websites when these services are embedded inside an existing
app or platform. What's more, "Buy Now Pay Later" is the fastest-growing embedded finance model.
Customers can make their purchases first and split out their payments over time with this service. As a
result, experts predict that the market for embedded financial services will expand by 40.4% annually over
the next several years.

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Technology in Marketing
Technology in marketing is the use of technology to improve the effectiveness of marketing campaigns. This
can include the use of software, hardware, and data analytics to target customers, measure results, and improve
the customer experience.
There are many different ways that technology can be used in marketing. For example, technology can be used
to:

➢ Target customers more effectively: Technology can be used to collect data about customers, such as
their demographics, interests, and online behaviour. This data can be used to create targeted marketing
campaigns that are more likely to resonate with customers.
➢ Measure results: Technology can be used to track the results of marketing campaigns, such as
website traffic, leads generated, and sales. This data can be used to improve the effectiveness of future
campaigns.
➢ Improve the customer experience: Technology can be used to personalize the customer experience,
such as by recommending products or services that are relevant to the customer's interests. This can
help to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Technology is a powerful tool that can be used to improve the effectiveness of marketing campaigns. By using
technology effectively, marketers can reach more customers, measure results more accurately, and improve the
customer experience.
Some of the different aspects of tech in marketing that are important for people to know to get a job in sales
and marketing:

1. Marketing automation:

It is the use of software to automate marketing tasks, such as sending email campaigns, creating landing
pages, and tracking website traffic. By automating these tasks, marketers can save time and resources, and
focus on more strategic activities. Marketing automation software typically includes the following
features:

➢ Email marketing: This allows you to create and send email campaigns to your subscribers. You can
segment your subscribers based on their interests and behaviour, and send them personalized
messages.
➢ Landing pages: This allows you to create landing pages for your marketing campaigns. Landing pages
are designed to convert visitors into leads or customers.
➢ Website tracking: This allows you to track website traffic and measure the effectiveness of your
marketing campaigns.
➢ Lead nurturing: This allows you to nurture leads through the sales funnel. You can send leads
personalized content and track their progress.
➢ Reporting: This allows you to track the results of your marketing campaigns and measure their ROI.

Here are some of the benefits of using marketing automation:

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 ➢ Increased efficiency: Marketing automation can save you a lot of time by automating repetitive tasks.
This frees you up to focus on more strategic activities, such as creating content and building
relationships with customers.
➢ Improved personalization: Marketing automation allows you to personalize your marketing messages
for each individual customer. This can help you increase engagement and conversions.
➢ Better ROI: Marketing automation can help you track the results of your marketing campaigns and
measure their ROI. This information can be used to improve your campaigns over time.

2. Customer relationship management (CRM)

CRM is a system for managing a company's interactions with its customers. CRM software helps
companies track and store customer information, such as contact information, purchase history, and
preferences. This information can then be used to personalize marketing messages, improve customer
service, and identify new sales opportunities.

CRM is a critical tool for any business that wants to build and maintain strong customer relationships.
By using CRM, businesses can:

➢ Improve customer service: CRM software can help businesses track customer interactions and identify
potential problems. This information can then be used to resolve issues quickly and efficiently.
➢ Personalize marketing messages: CRM software can be used to track customer preferences and
interests. This information can then be used to personalize marketing messages, such as email
campaigns and social media posts.
➢ Identify new sales opportunities: CRM software can track customer interactions and identify potential
sales opportunities. This information can then be used to reach out to customers and close deals.

Here are some of the benefits of using CRM in marketing:

➢ Increased customer satisfaction: CRM can help you improve customer satisfaction by providing them
with a more personalized and seamless experience.
➢ Increased sales: CRM can help you increase sales by identifying and targeting your most valuable
customers.
➢ Reduced costs: CRM can help you reduce costs by automating tasks and improving efficiency.
➢ Improved decision-making: CRM can help you make better decisions about your marketing
campaigns by providing you with insights into your customers' behavior.

3. Content marketing

It is the creation and distribution of valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a
clearly defined audience—and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.
The key to successful content marketing is to create content that provides value to the audience, such
as educational or informative content that addresses their needs or challenges. By providing this type
of content, businesses can establish themselves as thought leaders in their industry and build trust and
credibility with their audience.
Content marketing can take many forms, including blog posts, videos, infographics, e-books, white
papers, podcasts, and social media posts. The content should be optimized for search engines to make

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 it easier for potential customers to find and should be tailored to the interests and needs of the target
audience.
The ultimate goal of content marketing is to drive profitable customer action, such as lead generation,
customer acquisition, and retention. By creating valuable content that speaks to their needs, businesses
can attract potential customers, build brand awareness, and establish themselves as industry experts.

4. Social media marketing

It is the use of social media platforms to connect with and build relationships with customers. Each social
media platform has its own unique audience and strengths, so it's important to choose the platforms that
are most relevant to your business and target market. To be successful with SMM, it's important to create
a social media marketing strategy. This strategy should include the following elements:

➢ Set goals. What do you want to achieve with your social media marketing? Do you want to increase
brand awareness, generate leads, or drive sales?
➢ Identify your target audience. Who are you trying to reach with your social media marketing? Once
you know who your target audience is, you can tailor your content and messaging to appeal to them.
➢ Choose the right social media platforms. Not all social media platforms are created equal. Choose the
platforms that are most relevant to your business and target market.
➢ Create high-quality content. Your social media content should be informative, engaging, and visually
appealing.
➢ Be consistent. The key to success with SMM is consistency. Post new content on a regular basis and
engage with your followers.
➢ Measure your results. It's important to track your results so you can see what's working and what's not.
Use social media analytics tools to track your reach, engagement, and website traffic.

5. Search engine optimization

SEO is the process of improving the visibility of a website or web page in search engine results pages
(SERPs).

There are two main types of SEO: on-page SEO and off-page SEO. On-page SEO refers to the
optimization of a website's content, structure, and code. This can be done by using relevant keywords,
creating high-quality content, and improving the website's loading speed. Off-page SEO refers to the
optimization of a website's backlinks. This can be done by building links to the website from other high-
quality websites.

SEO can be a complex and time-consuming process, but it can be very rewarding. By investing in SEO,
businesses can improve their website's ranking in SERPs and attract more visitors. This can lead to
increased sales, improved brand awareness, and higher profits.

Here are some of the benefits of SEO marketing:

➢ Increased website traffic: SEO can help to increase the number of visitors to your website. When your
website ranks higher in SERPs, more people will see it and click on it.
➢ Improved brand awareness: SEO can help to improve your brand awareness. When people see your
website ranking high in SERPs, they will be more likely to remember your brand.

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 ➢ Increased sales: SEO can help to increase your sales. When people visit your website, they may be
more likely to buy your products or services.
➢ Higher profits: SEO can help to increase your profits. When you have more visitors to your website
and more sales, you will naturally have higher profits.

6. Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising

PPC is a type of online advertising where advertisers pay a fee each time someone clicks on their ad.
There are many benefits to using PPC advertising, including:

➢ Targeted reach: PPC ads can be targeted to specific demographics, interests, and even locations. This
means that your ads are only seen by people who are likely to be interested in what you have to offer.
➢ Measurable results: PPC ads are very measurable, so you can track your results and see how much
money you're spending and how much you're earning. This information can be used to optimize your
campaigns and improve your results.
➢ Quick results: PPC ads can start generating results quickly, so you can start seeing a return on your
investment (ROI) sooner rather than later.

Here are some of the most common types of PPC ads:

➢ Search engine ads: These ads are displayed at the top or bottom of search engine results pages
(SERPs) for relevant keywords.
➢ Display ads: These ads are displayed on websites and other online platforms.
➢ Video ads: These ads are displayed before, during, or after videos.
➢ Social media ads: These ads are displayed on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and
LinkedIn.

7. Data analytics

It is the process of collecting, cleaning, and analysing data to extract insights that can be used to improve
marketing campaigns. Data analytics can be used to answer a variety of marketing questions, such as:

➢ Who are my customers?

➢ What are my customers interested in?
➢ How do my customers interact with my brand?
➢ What marketing campaigns are most effective?
➢ Where should I allocate my marketing budget?

By answering these questions, data analytics can help marketers to create more effective marketing
campaigns and improve their return on investment (ROI). Here are some of the benefits of using data
analytics in marketing:
➢ Improved customer insights: Data analytics can help marketers to gain a better understanding of their
customers, including their demographics, interests, and needs. This information can be used to create
more targeted and relevant marketing campaigns.
➢ Increased ROI: Data analytics can help marketers to improve their ROI by identifying the most
effective marketing campaigns and allocating their budget accordingly.
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 ➢ Increased efficiency: Data analytics can help marketers to automate tasks and streamline their
marketing processes. This can free up time for marketers to focus on more strategic initiatives.
➢ Improved decision-making: Data analytics can help marketers to make more informed decisions about
their marketing campaigns. This is because data analytics provides marketers with a clear
understanding of what is working and what is not.

8. Web analytics

It is the measurement, collection, analysis, and reporting of website data for the purpose of understanding
and improving website performance. Web analytics can be used for a variety of marketing purposes,
including:

➢ Understanding website traffic: Web analytics can be used to track the number of visitors to a website,
the pages they visit, and how long they stay on each page. This information can be used to identify
which pages are most popular and which pages are not performing well.
➢ Identifying trends: Web analytics can be used to identify trends in website traffic. This information
can be used to predict future traffic patterns and make changes to the website to improve performance.
➢ Measuring the effectiveness of marketing campaigns: Web analytics can be used to measure the
effectiveness of marketing campaigns. This information can be used to determine which campaigns
are generating the most traffic and leads.

Here are some of the benefits of using web analytics in marketing:

➢ Improved website performance: Web analytics can help you identify areas where your website can be
improved. For example, you may find that certain pages are not performing as well as others, or that
users are abandoning your website before they reach your call to action. By making changes to your
website based on web analytics data, you can improve your website's performance and increase
conversions.
➢ Increased website traffic: Web analytics can help you track the number of visitors to your website and
identify where they are coming from. This information can be used to improve your website's SEO
and attract more visitors.
➢ Improved marketing campaigns: Web analytics can help you track the effectiveness of your marketing
campaigns and identify which campaigns are generating the most leads and sales. This information
can be used to optimize your campaigns and improve your results.
➢ Improved customer insights: Web analytics can help you learn more about your customers, such as
their demographics, interests, and behaviour on your website. This information can be used to create
more targeted and relevant marketing campaigns.

9. Marketing technology (MarTech)

It is the collection of software and tools that marketers use to plan, execute, and measure marketing
campaigns. The use of MarTech has grown rapidly in recent years, as businesses have increasingly turned
to technology to help them reach and engage with their customers. In fact, there are now over 7,000
MarTech solutions available on the market. There are many benefits to using MarTech. For example,
MarTech can help marketers to:

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 ➢ Reach more customers: MarTech can help marketers to reach more customers by targeting their
marketing campaigns more effectively. For example, CRM software can help marketers to segment
their customer base and create targeted marketing messages.
➢ Engage customers: MarTech can help marketers to engage customers by providing them with more
personalized and relevant experiences. For example, marketing automation platforms can help
marketers to send targeted emails and social media messages.
➢ Measure results: MarTech can help marketers to measure the results of their marketing campaigns
more accurately. For example, analytics tools can help marketers to track website traffic, social media
engagement, and sales.

Overall, MarTech can be a valuable tool for marketers. By using MarTech, marketers can reach more
customers, engage them more effectively, and measure the results of their marketing campaigns more
accurately. Here are some of the most common types of MarTech tools:
➢ Customer relationship management (CRM) software: CRM software helps businesses to manage their
customer relationships. This includes tracking customer interactions, storing customer data, and
managing customer support.
➢ Marketing automation platforms: Marketing automation platforms help businesses to automate their
marketing tasks. This includes sending emails, creating landing pages, and managing social media
campaigns.
➢ Social media management tools: Social media management tools help businesses to manage their
social media accounts. This includes scheduling posts, responding to comments, and measuring
engagement.
➢ Analytics tools: Analytics tools help businesses to track their website traffic, social media
engagement, and sales. This information can be used to improve marketing campaigns and measure
results.

Having the knowledge of these different aspects of tech in marketing can give you a competitive edge in
the job market. By understanding how to use these technologies, you can be more effective in your
marketing efforts and help your company achieve its goals.
In addition to the above, it is also important to have strong communication and interpersonal skills, as well
as the ability to think strategically and creatively. If you have these skills and knowledge, you will be well-
positioned for a successful career in sales and marketing.

References:
➢ https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/marketing-technology
➢ https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/8564-future-of-marketing.html
➢ https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/technical-skills

Technology in operations

In a supply chain and operations, the primary objective is to maximize the surplus or the profit which is the
difference between the price paid by the consumer and the total cost of making the product (or delivering the

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service). Among the three components, assets and products flow forwards, funds flow backwards while
information alone flows along both the directions.
Also, managers have to take decisions at the strategic, tactical and operational levels. IT systems play a vital
role in all these stages. Consider the operational level decisions to be taken. The head of a manufacturing shop
should at any time know which machines are operating and which have broken-down, the operators who are on
leave, and the status of a customer order in terms of the ability to meet the promised delivery date. An IT system
that monitors the activities in the shop can akin to an air traffic control system provide the above information
in real time. The system can provide alerts, alarms and automatically notify those who need to be.

Some key technologies used in operations management:

Enterprise Resource Planning Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Software as the name suggests helps in
planning and managing the resources (men, material, money, machines) of the entire enterprise. ERP can cover
departments such as sales, marketing, human resources, finance, manufacturing, purchasing and warehouse. By
transcending departmental barriers and seamlessly integrating applications and by extracting data from different
sources, the ERP provides a holistic view of the organization.
The modules of an ERP system can either work as stand-alone units or several modules can be combined
together to form an integrated system. Enterprise systems employ thin client/server (C/S) technology or client/
fat server (C/FS) architecture, creating a decentralized computing environment.

CAD-CAM technology is the result of decades of efforts by numerous people in the name of production
automation. It is the vision of innovators and inventors, mathematicians and machinists, who are all working to
build the future and drive production with technology. A lot of people use the term "CAD-CAM" when they
talk about the software that is used to make things with a CNC machine. CAD stands for Computer-Aided
Design and CAM stands for Computer-Aided Manufacturing, both of which are used to make things.
CAD/CAM software is used to design and manufacture prototypes, finished products and production runs of
products.

Flexible manufacturing system (FMS) is a production method that is designed to easily adapt to changes in
the type and quantity of the product being manufactured. Machines and computerized systems can be configured
to manufacture a variety of parts and handle changing levels of production.

Bar Codes Barcode is an automatic identification (AutolD) technology that helps computers to identify
products. For example, in retail chains, products can be identified and billed directly by reading the codes. In
manufacturing, inventory can be tracked by reading the codes and checking the total number of items available
in each type.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Radio Frequency Identification refers to the use of radio frequency
waves to read information contained in a microchip embedded in a small tag which is placed on any object.
This chip can store any type of information. Example of information that can be stored in the chip- In
pharmaceutical industry, it can contain the batch code, date of manufacture, date of expiry, storage (do not
expose to sunlight, keep it in refrigerator etc.) instructions

Picking Technologies in Warehouse Pick to Light (PTL) uses a display device mounted at the front of a shelf
and wired together. The main business system (usually WMS) sends data to the PTL computer-server, which
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lights up the display device (module) for each item and displays the quantity to be picked. The picker presses a
device button to mark an item as picked. When all item-specific displays are pressed, a master display device
lights up green to indicate the picker is ready for the next order and red to indicate an error.

Put To Light systems are designed for retail distribution. Distribution centres serving retail stores use Put to
Light. Put to Light, also known as Put to Store, optimises cross-docking operations by breaking down a
percentage of full case quantities to store-level carton boxes for retail store replenishment order fulfilment.

The use of Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) and Robots are increasing in high velocity distribution centres.
For example, one unique system is Kiva's automated material handling systems which consists of several com-
ponents. The robotic drive units (bots), mobile inventory shelves (pods), and software are unique to Kiva
Systems.

Near Field Communication NFC is a short-range radio technology that operates on the13.56MHz frequency,
with data transfers of up to 424 kilobits per second. NFC communication is triggered when two NFC-compatible
devices are brought within a distance of about four centimetres. Since the transmission distance is so short,
NFC-based transactions are inherently secure.

Cloud Computing Cloud Computing is very similar to the time-sharing model used in main- frame computing
where the resources of a single large computer were shared among many users.

Digital twin Digital twin technology is an emerging tool that has the potential to revolutionize operations
management by creating a virtual replica of physical assets, systems, and processes. With the help of digital
twins, operations managers can simulate, monitor, and optimize their operations in a virtual environment,
resulting in improved efficiency, reduced downtime, and better decision-making.

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