Cisco unveils new initiative to help Sri Lanka’s digital transformation

Cisco this week increased its commitment in Sri Lanka with the launch of Cisco START- a new initiative specifically designed to help Sri Lankan SMBs build their digital foundation and become globally competitive.

This initiative is a demonstration of Cisco’s commitment to accelerate Sri Lanka’s digital transformation and showcase how digitization can fuel economic growth, world-class innovation, sustainable competitiveness, and prosperity, the company said in a media release.

“A digitized country aims to drive GDP growth, create jobs and foster innovation, enhance research and education, stimulate entrepreneurship, accelerate business innovation, develop economic cluster initiatives, and support infrastructure. Towards that, Cisco is the leading technology partner helping countries become digital hubs of innovation by building sophisticated and forward-thinking IT network ecosystems that allow for greater connectivity, productivity, and security. Through the digital transformation of Sri Lanka, Cisco will work with governments and businesses to grow GDP, create new jobs, train the future workforce, build smart cities, develop new business models and enable better quality of life for residents and more satisfying experiences for visitors. Cisco is also looking to collaborate with the public sector and contribute to large- scale transformation projects such as broadband networks, development of smart cities as well as education, and healthcare in Sri Lanka,” it said.

High- speed broadband coverage, rising adoption of mobile devices, proliferation of data, improving quality of connectivity as well as the expansion of logistics services and networks are breaking the geographical market barriers for Sri Lankan businesses and opening up new opportunities. Cisco said it recognises that Sri Lankan small and medium- sized businesses (SMBs) are a critical industry which will accelerate Sri Lanka’s digitization and create vast opportunities for economic competitiveness and job creation.

SMBs and midmarket account for almost 52 per cent of Sri Lanka’s GDP and employ a workforce of over a million people making it one of the most critical high-growth segment in the country. With Sri Lanka looking to drive growth through digitization, SMBs have become an essential component of the country’s digital transformation journey. However, SMBs face challenges such as access to right technology, lack of skill sets as well as high entry cost that limit their ability to scale and seize opportunities provided by digitization.

“Cisco START aims to make it easy for SMBs and midmarket customers to embrace digitization by providing them with access to a suite of simple, secure and smart enterprise- class technologies, specifically tailored to their needs,” it said.