Right now, almost every company in the world is facing the same question - what does long-term recovery and resilience look like? This requires both a reflection on what worked and didn’t work - as well as a look ahead to what is next.

Organizations are also fundamentally rethinking their product and service portfolios. They are considering things like how to best reach their customers; how they can reinvent their supply chains to manage supply challenges and ever-changing demands; how can they enable their employees and other aspects of digital business - all of which require key network and connectivity considerations.

Digital transformation is no longer an option but rather a necessity to maintain business continuity. The focus is now on building a strong digital infrastructure and prioritizing upcoming investments and resource allocation. Our customers continue to impress with their ability to bring on new digital products and services, automation of IT, disaster recovery and supply chain resilience. Their stories can serve as inspiration for other organizations navigating their digital transformation journey.

Reflecting on the changes made

For many, the shifts in how business is being done were initially thought to be temporary. When employees walked away from their desks or workspaces a year ago, they were likely thinking that they would return to normal in a few weeks, or at most a month. According to Mark Frattarola, former director of sales engineering, Comcast Business, the changes made were done with a more temporary mindset. “Initially, companies made somewhat temporary fixes to accommodate the increased connectivity needs that a more remote workforce brings. However, there has now been a shift to more permanent solutions.”

As a result, businesses are working in an environment much more reliant on the internet. Whether it’s the need to cater to online customers that once walked through their doors, or employees settling in to working from home, network connectivity, security, and reliability remain paramount to getting business done.

All things considered, the quick pivot to online commerce activities went relatively well, and formerly long-term digital transformation plans accelerated to become immediate network infrastructure needs.

The look ahead

The changes made in 2020 were a quick pivot to accommodate a more remote workforce. Looking ahead, digital interactions with customers have become the norm and increasingly, the expectation. Many workers are expected to stay largely remote as companies find cost savings in employing a remote workforce. According to Frattarola, “IT departments are being tasked with meeting security and access challenges brought on by the need to support a hybrid workforce model.”

As employers work to extend office infrastructure to remote locations, technologies like SD-WAN are being utilized more often to help control application priority and security, and quickly switch to second circuits when necessary to take pressure off overwhelmed networks. In addition, the VPN access and remote desktops utilized for increased use of collaboration tools is requiring more stringent security standardization to help protect networks that don’t have the typical network security afforded by on-premise solutions.

Digital success comes in many forms

To make these adjustments, there is no one size that fits all. Having a network provider that’s planning for the future is crucial to making sure your organization is ready to face the future’s challenges today. The following are just a few examples of how Comcast Business customers from a variety of verticals rapidly adjusted to meet just a few of the ever-evolving networking needs.

Healthcare

A large not-for-profit health systems relied on Comcast Business to increase its main circuit from one gigabit to three gigabits in order to ensure more than 6,000 affiliated physicians and over 20,000 employees could stay connected.

FinServe

An online lending business deployed Comcast Business Ethernet fiber connectivity at multiple sites to support business-critical data applications, as well as Comcast Business VoiceEdge® to provide employees with an effective internet-based voice solution. This allowed them to gain more control over plans and usage and give employees a voice solution that helps them stay productive.

Hospitality

A hospitality management company implemented a managed Wi-Fi solution for more than 10,000 rooms in over a dozen hotels, allowing the hotel management company to reduce operational complexities, manage costs, and keep guests connected with fast Wi-Fi.

Retail

An online delivery service that offers the ability to order a wide variety of food and home goods through their app has more than tripled its footprint over the last 18 months. They were able to remain ahead of the curve, by leveraging SD-WAN and microservices to constantly iterate and create purpose-built solutions for consumers in a rapidly changing environment. Their software-defined perimeter powers the appropriate levels of access and security from end-to-end. And their cloud-first, cloud-native approach enables them to rapidly expand across the country and future-proof innovation.

The changes our customers have made to accommodate a more digital employee and customer experiences can serve as inspiration. All businesses are navigating somewhat unchartered territory and learning as they go.