To begin, Ryan and Astrid will discuss how technology is, in essence, a way to enhance people’s lives. Astrid’s experiences in her previous workplace, Microsoft demonstrate her involvement with the topic, and its ‘people aspect’. Costumer-focused technology, as she explains, can make Signify a gamechanger not only in the field of lighting, but also, in digital.

Every journey needs a map – and Signify’s digital journey is no different. While talking about what is Signify doing, to stay in the lead of digitalization, Astrid will introduce our roadmap. Considering customer needs and generated values, this document decides on prioritized areas of development – for example, interfaces, e-commerce, internal processes and even A.I, and many more. Having such a plan can help us accelerate our dive into digital.

Just to get you excited about our destination, a digital future, Astrid will also let you know about something really cool we’re working on: LightFinder! LightFinder is an app that allows AI to recognize your customer needs, helps you to get to the bulb that’s right for you, and on top of that, provides a way to augment your reality, and experience how our products would look like in your home. It’s development was a challenge, but a valuable collaborative learning experience on our path towards digitalization. The key, as Astrid explains, is trying new things.

By doing this, we’re picking up speed. Ryan and Astrid discuss how an external factor – the elephant in the house, really: the COVID-19 pandemic - has forced us to do so, by turning online meetings, and digital working commonplace. However, Astrid believes that we can always develop faster to stay in the lead – hence the roadmap discussed above.

Astrid also has some insightful comments on the general trends in the digitalization arena. Augmented reality, Big Data, robotics, and data ethics are just a few examples of what defines the ever-changing path of digitalization. However, she knows that it’s not a cakewalk, so she’ll also discuss potential challenges, which stem from the immense speed technology develops – so immense, that humans sometimes struggle to catch up. She finds it important to keep the digital journey an inclusive one. Nobody should be left behind, despite the generation gap. To bridge this, we must provide everyone with the necessary skills.

To finish up such a great talk, in the final section, you can get to know Astrid herself, through her answers to Ryan’s ‘5 alternative questions’. Here, you will hear about a lot of things, from double shot espresso and book recommendations to superpowers and polar bears – I don’t want to spoil everything though, so go ahead, and give it a listen.