In a Technology Vision 2014 report,consulting firm Accenture discussed major trends that drive a dramatic transformation for every business to enter a digital world. As they described, the excitement is to change from being "digitally disrupted" today to "digital disrupters" tomorrow. The huge opportunity is for businesses position themselves as leaders in this new world.

Many forces are at work in the journey of this remarkable transition. Among them, three dominant factors will play a vital role to determine whether this digital transformation will be successful: anintelligent information edge, IT simplicityandcybersecurity.

At the edge of the new digital world, intelligent and real-time technologies allow people to act and react faster to achievebetter experience and outcome. While mobile device explosion serves as a clear indicator of this rapid transition, greater potential lies ahead to fully utilize the power of mobility, analytics, cloud computing and other new technologies. For a preview of what is possible, check out how Fernbank Natural History Museum integrates 3G/4G and Wi-Fi seamlessly. The outcome is an dynamic application that brings an immersive and interactive experience to the visitors, instead of forcing them to find the information.

Technical complexity arises, as more and more applications, systems and infrastructure are added together over time.  Cisco Global IT Impact Survey in 2013 found that nearly three out of four IT participants (71 percent) were deploying more applications than a year ago. Without IT simplicity, IT departments will be rapidly consumed by day-to-day fire drills. They will lose their ability to innovate and their relevance to the business.

When everything moves to digital, cybersecurity takes the center stage. A series of recent cyber breaches exposed the security vulnerability of many businesses and organizations. In the cyber breach at J.P. Morgan Chase, contact information of 76 million customers of the largest US bank was stolen. "This is among the most troubling breaches ever - and not just because of its magnitude, but becauseit proves that there is probably no database that cyber criminals cannot compromise," Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan said on Oct 3, 2014 in a statement.  Let me repeat it. There is probably no database that cyber criminals cannot compromise.Now it's time to take a long and hard look at how we do cybersecurity.

Ultimately, going digital is not just about simply adding technology into our infrastructure. The eventual goal is to use technology to become leaders in the new digital world. So, how do we embrace and build an intelligent information edge? What are the best practices to achieve IT simplicity? And what can we do to strengthen cybersecurity? There are many approaches. And I'm sure that you have plenty of ideas.

Cisco will host a live webcast on Oct 28^thto discuss how you can use the Catalyst 3850 switching platform to address these challenging issues, as well as the latest product enhancements and use cases. You can register by clicking here. See you at the webcast!