Michael Lindholm: The digital business development future

We are at a turning point of digital development, which has been boosted by the availability of a bunch of new technologies such as AI, as well as the vast amount of data collected across the globe every second. We can read about huge digital development steps in various business areas and no single business area is left untouched.

Unfortunately, Europe has fallen behind when talking about business models based on data. These solutions are currently centralized to a few large players mainly from USA and China, with India as one of the fastest growers. It is harder than ever to publish digital products without “thinking globally”.

Earlier, Europe has pretty much neglected digital business development. We have started seeing a change only during the last five or ten years. The new Digital Europe programme with a planned budget of 7,5 billion euros is a substantial resource which has the potential to boost some digital development in the fields of healthcare, manufacturing, and sustainability, among others. Where do we find our real opportunities? Should we link up and cooperate with the large players, should we rely on clever start-ups, should we focus on our existing SME growth companies, or something else? Should we focus on a broad variety of solutions? We have certainly not lost the game and I do have thoughts on how we in the Nordic countries can stay at the top spots in the ranking of digital masters.

There are strong indications of digital development directions where we have a strong foundation in Nordic cultures and ways thinking. Our societies are built upon skills, democracy, equality, and fairness. They are strong foundations for success. Research driven and more modular, and data driven solutions that are driven by strong business models, as well as deep vertical business – these all play major roles in the bigger picture. This a big hurdle and at the same time a game changer for most of the business areas. Traditional software development companies are transforming towards deep business knowledge consulting, whereas domain-specific “traditional” companies are moving towards heavy data-based business models, but these models are in most cases not strong enough. Collaboration, clever sharing of data, and functionality work together to enable new opportunities and thereby new avenues for business.

I am currently working on the Smart City Digital Twins research project, regionally funded by Southwest Finland. One of the goals for this project is to find out the right ways for developing shareable modular digital twin software solutions for four cities in Finland, Poland, and Lithuania. Here’s an example: Who has not run into the situation of having to download a new set of apps for every city or country you visit? There are apps for every purpose, from local services to long distance travel. City infrastructure XR modelling, data related to decision making, traffic management, XR experiences solutions, etc. are often developed in parallel for every city, which creates unnecessary costs. Another example is the question of who owns the data. Could we maybe rebuild the ownership so that the individuals own their data, or so that the data is connected to owned objects like cars or buildings? What if we could agree on modular sharable models where the individual can also monetize their own data and the owned object data? What if we could agree on a model where residents/owners of a building can decide how they want to share the available data for purposes such as energy optimization?

The key for the above ideas to succeed requires new business model thinking, data sharing via e.g., open API’s (Application Program Interface, a very common way of sharing data and functionality) where a variety of service providers cooperate with larger digital platforms. Finland and Sweden, with their closely intertwined and comparable infrastructures and cultures, opens possibilities that not many neighbouring countries have. We have the data, the skills, as well as the social and cultural thinking needed for starting business models with modular open data sharing. We need to get around the traditional thinking of linear processes dedicated to certain tasks and move our sights towards more horizontal business thinking. We should also open regional funding opportunities to enable pilot projects that involve international partners for faster piloting, where failure is allowed.

There are some movements towards this on the EU level. Last year Finland published a national API strategy document initiated by the government headed by then prime minister Sanna Marin. Simultaneously, Business Finland started a Data Economy programme with the goal of creating more data based modular business models. We are happy to collaborate, just give us a call!

Turku Science Park Ltd is a non-profit development company funded by 11 municipalities in Southwest Finland. We work closely with universities, companies and the public sector helping all parties in the field of business development, research, and cooperation.