Innovation is a critical currency of modern business, but for many, it doesn’t always come naturally. Organisations can become stuck making the same decisions that resulted in past success. Doing what’s always been done is the easiest route, and innovation, at times, seems like an extraordinary goal.
For NTT DATA, however, the route to the extraordinary has always been the ordinary. Innovation is part of our routine, our culture, our ‘business as usual’, and the reason for this is ingrained in our approach to Research and Development (R&D).
Commitment to R&D
Altogether, NTT Group invests $3.6 billion in R&D every year. Globally, amongst other consulting and system integrators, that figure puts us at the very top. With 2,500 people dedicated to NTT R&D, and many more in our NTT DATA innovation labs around the world, we’re able to create truly pioneering technologies and experiences that unleash the power of imagination and inventive thinking.
We invest in ideas that we know can shape the future of business and humanity itself – ideas that society doesn’t just want, but needs. Our R&D is the driving force behind a broader, long term, global movement towards a truly smart world – a world that is at once efficient, intelligent, but also, sustainable.
For NTT DATA, these efforts are spread across our six Digital Focus Areas (DFAs):
- Data & Intelligence
- Intelligent Automation
- Customer Experience
- Internet of Things
- IT Optimisation
- Cyber Security
Large-scale R&D activity in these spaces puts us in an enviable position. Certainly, it strengthens the core of the business, allowing NTT DATA to build, sustain and enhance its position over competitors, maintaining our status as leaders in the market.
But R&D is also a key point of differentiation. Our R&D success means that, unlike most consulting organisations which simply talk and theorise about the future of technology, NTT DATA can do so much more. The company is there at the coalface of real R&D with practical applications. We’re not just speaking about the future. We’re shaping the future.
Impact on clients
For clients in particular, that provides very real benefits. By enhancing, improving, and continually developing our technologies and services, we’re able to dramatically enhance what we’re able to provide. Dozens of examples could be found at this year’s R&D Forum in Tokyo.
One illustration of NTT R&D in action was Piper, a botnet visualisation tool that’s already being used in the cyber security services we deliver. The platform can analyse and visualise billions of data points in real-time by applying machine learning to our own network data. By entering an IP address of interest, the tool generates and displays a graph that shows related IP addresses and the relationship between them.
Another example, already implemented on the ground in Las Vegas, is NTT DATA Services’ Smart City Solution. This tool uses Internet of Things (IoT) devices, high-definition video cameras, and sound sensors to monitor a public space, and is designed to reduce reaction times for first responders. By alerting responders to cues such as shattering glass, gunshots, or other loud noises, the platform is already supporting emergency services in tackling crime and serious weather incidents.
Building the future
They say that the best way to predict the future is to create it. And that’s most definitely what we as a company envisage through our R&D efforts.
Our developments are a testament to an unwavering commitment to shaping the future of business and society itself. It’s a promise, to clients and to ourselves, to continuously improve, to deliver quality, and to forge long-term partnerships. That, in essence, is what NTT DATA’s R&D is all about: taking clients to the next level.
Our clients across every industry and sector want to be lighter, faster, stronger, brighter, more effective or more efficient – and our R&D provides the edge that allows them to achieve exactly that.
