Romania, difficult to identify on Europe’s digitalization map. 6 out of 10 companies have problems with digital transformation, study shows

Digitization is a process that will not leave unchanged any business model or industry. Even if there still are voices claiming that not all industries will be impacted by digitalization, technological advances in Big Data and cloud, artificial intelligence, robots and drone, Internet of Things (IoT) make this scenario unlikely. In Romania, 35 percent of companies say that digitalization has already had a big influence on operations and only 7 percent say they had no influence, as shown by the Barometer of Digitalization in Romanian Companies conducted by consultancy company Valoria in partnership with Doingbusiness.ro.

At this time, 31 percent of Romanian companies say that are confident about digitalization because they have the knowledge to navigate the process. On the other hand, 61 percent say they have difficulties with digital transformation. Of these, 39 percent are (somewhat) distrustful that they will capitalize on this trend. Only 2 percent of companies say they have no confidence that digital transformation is good for the company.

However, digitalization is a difficult process for companies. Of the companies highly influenced by digital transformation, 62 percent are confident and believe they have the knowledge to go through this process, but 38 percent are not in this situation. The percentage of those somewhat confident that they will capitalize on this trend are the largest (27 percent) among companies that say they were just moderately influenced by digitalization.

Against the backdrop of rapid technological advances, digitalization has become a priority for all industries, often radically changing the existing business models. But at this time, only 19 percent of Romanian companies consider that digital business models have greatly changed the industries they belong to.

Only 21 percent of companies expect digital business models to greatly transform their industry in the next 1-3 years, 38 percent say that digital business models will greatly transform their industry, and 27 percent expect that digital business models will only moderately affect their industry in the next 1-3 years.

“It’s amazing that only 12 percent of Romanian companies consider digital business models as a threat, whilst 59 percent expect these new business models to massively change their industry the next 1-3 years,” Valoria survey notes.

The opportunity cost of the digitalization will be expensive for the conservative local companies. Business models based on digitalization or strongly influenced by it are imposed in more and more industries. Only the companies that will reinvent themselves in this new digital environment will survive and prosper, the survey points out.