Senior executives responsible for digital transformation in their business-to-business organisations flocked to Berlin this week for the inaugural InternetRetailing B2B Summit.
In total close to 60 delegates, from organisations as diverse as Amazon Business, Hugo Boss, Ralph Lauren, Siemens Building Technologies and RS Components, were at the event for a day of discussions around the challenges and benefits of putting digital at the heart of the business.
Themes under discussion in a series of round tables, leadership panels and workshops included the pain points of digital transformation, the need for transparency in the process and approaches to data. The event was held under the Chatham House Rule. We’ve focused on those themes in-depth here.
“The first B2B Summit provided a unique opportunity for business-to-business organisations to come together to talk frankly and openly about the challenges they’re facing as they move towards digital,” said Ian Jindal, editor-in-chief of InternetRetailing. “Although these were companies from very different sectors, it was illuminating to hear how much they had in common, from the need to manage change within sometimes very traditional organisations, and the need to lead from the board yet delegate to agile teams, right down to the sheer daunting scale of the data they need to manage, and of the infrastructure that they need to build.”
The event sponsors were commerce platform provider Intershop, logistics business Panalpina, personalisation specialist Apptus and warehouse logistics business Schaefer.
Jindal said: “This event could not have taken place without the generosity of our sponsors and we’re delighted that these organisations could also contribute by taking part in the event and joining our discussions.”
The next in the series of InternetRetailing Europe Summits will be held in July and is focused on business-to-consumer retail. More details are available here.
