"In data we trust"

ANTONIO: Digitalization is the new language of the economy. It’s the way to guarantee communication with other businesses and connection with the market. Digitalization means the opportunity to have the right tools and information to address your market opportunities. It’s the mechanism to exchange data and interact with suppliers and customers. If you don’t speak the new language, you’ll be totally disconnected, so digital transformation is no longer just an option now—it’s mandatory. If you don't follow the latest trends in technology, your company will be much less competitive compared to those that, say, use a CRM or offer an online service or an AI-supported service. And when we are talking about ERP and resource planning, if you don't follow the same standards, applications, data exchange systems, and technologies as your partners, then there will be disruption and you will not be able to continue being part of that end-to-end value chain.

GAVIN: What is the role of cloud computing and cloud services in that transformation, and what can they potentially offer industries? 

ANTONIO: Companies like Huawei bring democratization. Because the Cloud guarantees that every company in the world has access to the latest technologies with a minimal barrier. Cloud computing means offering everything as a service, independently of where you are or what current infrastructure you have in place. It's a way to say "Don't worry, we will have everything ready for you." So Huawei Cloud is the solution to guarantee that everybody can join the transformation without a big investment or barriers and without continuous renewal and adaptation. It’s about infrastructure and the latest services relevant to your company, whether that’s accounting or data analytics, or interfaces with other companies. And it’s all offered to you in a straightforward way.

GAVIN: So what responsibility does a company such as Huawei have, as a developer and supplier of advanced technology and solutions, in this transformation? 

ANTONIO: The responsibility of Huawei is to guarantee access to a complete and trusted ecosystem that offers no less opportunity and no higher barrier to services than what is available via other cloud suppliers, and in fact is often better. Huawei Cloud, for example, is the first in the world to offer global support for Data Spaces [an advanced service to build trusted data-sharing ecosystems in supply chains]. They provide the interfaces and protocol to guarantee the data chain from the Global South to China to Europe. It’s an example of their philosophy of investment in innovation, as they’re doing with AI. This trusted data flow is crucial, and enabling it provides a win-win for everybody. Cloud services allow you to forecast future demand, access information about delays in supply and minimize risk, optimize production quality end to end, and guarantee that suppliers follow the same rules and speak the same language in terms of certification, requirements, and quality. It’s sustainable and is the mechanism to ensure that global complementarity exists. For example, some Chinese cars use a lot of European components from Germany and Spain. It’s a new opportunity of guaranteed quality, standards, and optimization. We can learn from China about cost effectiveness and they can learn from us about designs and previous experience. It’s about cooperation and digital exchange.

GAVIN: Increased digitalization tends to prompt increased data security concerns. But do you think that this is actually a golden era for the safe and efficient flow of data? 

ANTONIO: Digital transformation means a data economy and that in turn means we will rely on data: "In Data We Trust." The data has to be secure and satisfy minimum standards, to be reliable. When you want to test the maximum temperature a material can withstand, you need to guarantee that number so the tests need to be rigorous and the conditions must be applicable, and certificated. In the era of digital transformation, high-value datasets are created with artificial intelligence based on original datasets. Transforming data is when you have a high risk of introducing errors and reducing data quality. That is where having an end-to-end supplier such as Huawei can give you security infrastructure and high communication capabilities, to guarantee reliability. How you acquire the data is important, and that’s why Europe is now imposing what are called data cleaning houses to validate the algorithms and ensure there’s no reduction in data quality. 

GAVIN: What digital transformation are you most looking forward to and what do you think innovation and cloud computing hold for industry ten years from now?

ANTONIO: I really believe that in the future we are not going to be able to differentiate between digital and physical reality. There will be seamless integration, and interfaces such as smartphone applications, laptops, or other consumer devices will disappear. You can have technology embedded in glasses as the interface, and the natural voice is another interface—natural interfaces between the natural and digital worlds will be widely deployed and adopted. We will also spend far more time in the digital world and be connected for more hours than now, but not by having to look at a screen for hours a day; you will be connected seamlessly, using the physical world as your interface. The interfaces could be natural language, natural gestures, and even thinking—Neuralink is already creating these opportunities and maybe years from now it could be offering the natural interface between your brain and the world, with analysis of your facial expressions or moving your hand, etc. You won’t need to send a computer command.

GAVIN: So how will industries have to change to respond to that very different world?

ANTONIO: Well, transport is a very good example: I’m pretty confident that ten years from now no one will need a driving license, in the same way that people now don’t need to know how to ride a horse. Highly synchronized multi-modal mobility will be a reality—autonomous vehicles will take you from your home and connect you to that fast train you need to catch—everything will be optimized and integrated. Computer vision will be ubiquitous too, which is why Huawei is right to be investing in the Internet of Video Things (IoVT). There will be cameras and video analysis and video interpretation of your movement. So safety in the workplace will be much better.

There will be AR instructions and information alongside your physical world. There will be the capacity for the environment to see and monitor you, and how you consume the digital content will be totally natural. In the same way that today we have internet everywhere and you get coverage in your pocket through your phone, in the future everyone will be able to consume augmented reality. It’ll be an expanded access and very democratized. You won’t need to make a big effort or use a specific interface to be connected. There will be millions of cameras, millions of connected cars, sensing and fully connected infrastructure to enable these AI capabilities—it’ll be about critical mass and volume of information and data. The system will have the power to understand and communicate with you, analyzing complex video and images and processing data streams. It will be aware of your needs without you asking. The explosion of awareness and capabilities to help you will be both extremely disruptive and seamless.