Complex, indeed.

Let’s break it down: Foundationally, digital transformation occurs when technologies (such as artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and social/mobile analytics) converge to catalyze heightened customer engagement, streamlined business operations, innovative product creation, and empowered employees. It’s a strategy that spans every industry and vertical, but nowhere is its footprint as large as it is in the cloud market.

The cloud has completely changed how companies design, architect and fulfill their IT and business initiatives. This isn’t exactly surprising, for the cloud provides a playing field where boundaries to innovation are nonexistent. With unfettered access to the data and insights cloud provides, the very lifeblood of business has changed, and companies are suddenly finding themselves in a new market – a market so ripe that IDC estimates its economic value to be $20 trillion – more than 20 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).

That’s a market ripe for the taking.

So, how exactly do services, software, or hardware companies transform themselves to become digitally enabled? The journey all starts with cloud.

To learn more about the digital transformation opportunity that awaits businesses, download the 5-part Microsoft eBooks series here.