Accelerating Digital Transformation

#AskTheCEO Podcast

Peter Koerte is the Chief Technology Officer and Chief Strategy Officer at Siemens. Contact Peter: Web: http://siemens.com/xcelerator LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterkoerte/ Twitter: @PeterKoerte Contact Avrohom: Web: https://asktheceo.biz Facebook: AvrohomGottheil Twitter: @avrohomg Instagram: @avrohomg INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS: Avrohom: So, we're here live at Xcelerator where, Peter, you just announced something really exciting about this new exciting thing that Siemens has launched called Xcelerator. Can you share with us a little bit about what's behind all this? Peter: Yeah, sure. So, Siemens Xcelerator is all about making digital transformation for our customers insanely easy. To make it fast, easy, and at scale. And the B2B environment, that's really tricky. Because you have to ensure that data silos are being broken down and that data is flowing seamlessly. So, the heart of Siemens Xcelerator is being open, so that it brings different solutions from different vendors together, and then make it interoperable so that these things do work together. These are the two magics that we do with Siemens Xcelerator for our customers. Avrohom: I love what you said about breaking down the data silos, because in the legacy world, that's what we have. We have people that only focus on their vertical, their products, and nothing else, and we need to interoperate with one another. Which brings up the next point. So, I come from the Telecom world, and we had this term called vendor lock-out, where you buy all your hardware and equipment from this one vendor, and they kind of hold you. You have to buy their network, you have to buy their equipment, and you can't buy anything else. So, how does Siemens address this vendor lock-out? Peter: Yes, it's a big topic also for us, and for our customers. So, if we talked today with CIO’s, they would say, “I don't want to be locked-in on your very specific solution.” And right they are! And we don’t want to either. So, all the CIO's are going to tell you, “I don't want to buy yet another platform.” So, it's always a question of the value that you bring. And they are very capable of opening up and also sharing data with us, providing that the solution you provide is really adding return on their part. And so for example in buildings, if you can demonstrate that the solution that you're implementing is: (a) is flexible enough that is does work in their environment, and that (b) that they really get potential savings, for example, out of energy efficiency, then they are perfectly fine and they're happy to do that. But it's always the value that you have to bring to the customers. That's the way we think about it. Avrohom: So now, talking about another value, everyone is talking about sustainability as being the next big thing. Be it climate change, or just government initiatives, and things like that. Does Siemens have any criteria for selecting their partners or suppliers when it comes to clean energy and sustainability? Peter: Yes, so at Siemens, we've given ourselves a target that we want to be carbon neutral in our own operations by 2030, and then also with all of our supplier base by 2050. So, therefore, we are heavily engaged with our partners and suppliers, as you said, in order to drive that down. So today, when you interact as a supplier with us, we have very stringent requirements. And it also comes down to the sharing. For example, if you want to know the product carbon footprint of our solutions that we brought to our customers, we need to know from OUR suppliers in order to make that work. So, that's just an example. So, yes, there are many criteria in order to get there. Watch this episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/OZ5lr22UoJo