ESCP Europe Alumni Magazine - n°149 - Juillet/Août 2013 - 19

FoCus

By Thomas LEJARS (96)

Innovation,
innovation…
How the growth of tablets will impact software and IT markets?
Thomas LEJARS, Managing Partner in charge of sales, marketing,
partnerships and international at Galigeo answers this question and
speaks of risks and opportunities in this context.

The tablet market did not really exist before 2010.
But now, millions of workers use these devices in
the enterprise. As a consequence, traditional IT
providers (mainly hardware and software vendors
and IT services firms) have to renew their offerings in order to catch emerging opportunities.
Organizations are facing 4 main challenges when
it is about the expansion of mobile devices:
- security (the Bring Your Own Device, BYOD,
means less control on data and systems
security)
- network dependency (strangely enough network
accessibility is not as wide as we need)
- adaptation costs of legacy applications (many
legacy systems will never be really compatible
with mobile devices)
- user experience.
The mobile revolution
However, just below this surface lies a torrent of
innovations that include mobile applications, social media, cloud computing which means a type
of Internet-based computing where different services (such as servers, storage and applications)
are delivered to an organization’s computers and
devices through the Internet, mobile payments,
machine-to-machine... My objective is not to list all
opportunities that would emerge from this new paradigm but to show how complex is the adaptation
of traditional vendors to this new market. My company, Galigeo, is specialized in Location Analytics
which is a way to solve complex location-based
problems such as site selection in retail, territory
management for sales forces, disease spreading
in public health...
The irruption of mobile devices is a fantastic opportunity for us given the explosion of geo-located
data that will require further analysis. As a matter
of fact, these systems generate (X,Y) coordinates

requiring mapping capabilities to give sense and better
insight. However, we have 2
challenges, both based on
the user experience and his
ability to understand large
volumes of heterogeneous
data:
- the switch from mousecomputers to touch-based
tablets has simplified the
user interface which offers
less but supposedly more intuitive features. Mobile users
increasingly expect the same
user interface in professional
applications than the one they have in their personal life even if these applications are much more
complex that the «Google search». This trend is in
opposition with the software mindset that always
imposed more and more features even if a small
fraction was really used. And believe me: it’s hard
to change the way R&D teams used to develop
software products!
- the mobile revolution just begins. It means
that our customers are far from being mature
in exploiting the potential of this new era. Most
organizations still wonder how to give value to
the large amount of geo data collected and if and
how their markets will be modified by the mobile
consumption. Of course, experimentations are
and have been carried out but we are still far from
a mass-market. Mobile advertisement is a very
good example of an emerging market with a new
value chain that might be very different from the
one we know in traditional digital advertisement.
The mobile revolution has generated immature
customers with a strict requirement for a simple
and intuitive user experience. That may cause a
major breakthrough in the software market.
●

ESCP Europe Magazine N° 149 - Juillet/Août 2013 -

Table des matières de la publication ESCP Europe Alumni Magazine - n°149 - Juillet/Août 2013

Couverture
Zapping
Sommaire
BUSINESS
Personnalités du mois Cyril ZIMMERMANN (94) : Un avenir prometteur
Focus
L'appel du numérique
E-learning
Innovation, innovation…
Data is gold
Speed and risk
La fin du e-commerce
Photo réussie !
Managing queues
A win-win situation
The fabulous box
A gateway to Brazil
Itinéraires
Changez vos ampoules !
Grands crus
Manger bon, frais et sain
Entretiens
Maroc
Nouvelles technologies
Cloud
NEWS
Vie du réseau
Etienne PREVOST (MSE 94), Directeur du Who's Who in France
Nominations
Alumni Forum 2013
Groupe Centre
Groupe ESCP Europe au Féminin
Groupe Normandie
Groupe Seniors Actifs
Premier week-end de ski
Agenda/Carnet
À lire
Carrière
Réseaux sociaux, nouvel outil de votre carrière
Managing people remotely
Voyages En voiture !
CAMPUS
École Launching a business in the digital area
Fondation Soutenir les nouvelles générations
Vie étudiante
Toutes voiles dehors !
Changeons nous-mêmes l'éducation !
Let's celebrate curiosity!

ESCP Europe Alumni Magazine - n°149 - Juillet/Août 2013