The digital revolution continues to gather pace and traditional business models are undergoing unprecedented levels of disruption.
This has led to a wave of digital transformation initiatives across the African region. According to Andries Lombaard, country manager of International Data Corporation (IDC) South Africa, these initiatives require expert guidance to overcome the myriad of challenges and roadblocks that lie in wait.

“IDC’s South Africa CIO Summit has served as a pioneering platform for ICT thought leadership over the past nine years. As we celebrate its tenth anniversary in 2018, we will make sense of the region’s rapidly evolving digital transformation landscape where global and local analysts, market-leading vendors and more than 100 of the country’s most influential ICT leaders gather to lay down a blueprint for thriving in the digital economy,” says Lombard.

The key themes for the 2018 event, which will take place on 18 and 19 April at Zulu Nyala Country Manor, include transitioning from business to digital business, enabling disruptive automation, moving beyond customer relationship management to customer experience management, leveraging data as an asset, driving digital business at scale and embracing a new role for the IT function.

“As IDC, we know the role of the CIO is changing rapidly and this year we are introducing in-depth discussions with other lines of business within the organisation, to help attendees understand what their business requirements are and assist them in this transition,” says Lombaard.

“We are also very excited about adding focus groups to the programme. These sessions will be shaped by the latest developments in today’s IT environment and will include intimate roundtable discussions around topics such as cloud, IoT, smart cities, hyper-convergence and artificial intelligence.” Attendees will have 24 sessions to choose from, giving them the flexibility to tailor their Summit experience to meet their individual needs.

“IDC’s South Africa CIO Summit 2018 is much more than just another ICT conference,” he says. “We have tailored our programme to provide a mix of valuable information sharing sessions, in-depth discussions and the chance to network in a more relaxed environment with informal activities.”

For more information on IDC’s South Africa CIO Summit, please visit https://www.idc.com/mea/events/65073-idc-south-africa-cio-summit-2018.