According to the Managing Director and Senior Vice President of Engineering of Sysco LABS Shanil Fernando, “digital transformation was happening anyway pre-pandemic.” He added that “what the pandemic did was to accelerate this journey,” and categorised these changes into e-commerce and work, and social and learning collaborations.

“These pillars exploded through the pandemic,” he stated, noting that “platforms such as Google Classrooms had about 40 million users pre-pandemic but now there are over 150 million users.”

He also remarked that Sri Lankan companies such as oDoc – a medical consultation service – achieved a growth of 400 percent in their user base while apps like PickMe become the de facto platform for online purchases.

At the same time, he observed that “there is much penetration in digital banking.”

Moreover, he supported his views with a quote from a McKinsey report: “Something that would have typically taken seven years has been accelerated by the pandemic and now took less than a few months.”

In addition, he mentioned that there are “three significant behavioural patterns that happened because of the pandemic.” These are remote working, the collaboration between data, machine learning and AI, and the prominent role of the Chief Technical Officers and Chief Information Officers (CTO and CIOs) of an organisation.

Fernando observed that there’s access to global talent while companies that rely on virtual workplaces “have products and tools to aid productivity, and understand that e-commerce data will play a huge role in the industry.”

He added that “the collaboration of data, machine learning and AI will provide significant insights to the organisation as to how trade, people and teams are performing.” Meanwhile, he noted that “the role of the CTO and CIO has moved from being a back office function” to a more strategic one.

Meanwhile, Fernando commented that “it’s really important to cater to the demographics of people and employees,” and “create a culture and an environment that facilitates them to be the best in the workplace.” And he observed that the younger generation “want flexible time, value work-life balance and are much more liberal.”

He also asserted that “they look for less formal workplaces and global experiences” and seek to understand what impact they’re creating.

Furthermore, he remarked: “From an export perspective, we’re merely over a billion US Dollars a year at present with a target to achieve US$ 3 billion by 2023.” And Fernando highlighted the value of disruptive accelerations to achieve this.

“Every single dollar earned by IT exports goes directly into the nation’s economy,” he stressed while also stating that “there’s amazing talent in this country.” According to him, although the local IT industry is only about 24 years [old], it has been serving Fortune 500 companies.

“To take it to the next level, significant government intervention is necessary,” he asserted. Comparing the growth of two other remarkable Sri Lankan industries – viz. apparel and tea – Fernando noted that we are now reaping the rewards of past investments that were made in them; and he stated that the IT industry needs the same drive.

Alongside that, he affirmed that “we’re in the US$ 1.2-1.3 billion range over 20 plus years of existence; but we can make this a 10 billion dollar industry.” To this end, he emphasised the need to promote digital transformation beyond Colombo to the rural areas to ensure that 80-90 percent of the citizenry are using digital platforms to transact.

He concluded his views by mentioning that “by digitalising society, people become much more technology savvy; and before you know it, they will be selling their products and services in this virtual world to international clients.”

Fernando believes this will increase exports substantially; he added that “export dollars is what we need right now, and this is the way to do it.”