Digital transformation, the Holy Grail and the disruption of business models: Interview with Michael Nilles, Chief Digital and Information Officer, Henkel

In this interview Andreas Hinterhuber and Michael Nilles, CDIO of Henkel, discuss the game- changing opportunities that the digital transformation opens to companies that embed a digital core into their business models. Michael Nilles sees digital transformation as the Holy Grail: a force that is not easy to fi nd, not easy to capture and that has the potential to dramatically improve the customer experience. In B2C, the Holy Grail for Henkel’s Beauty Care business is for instance the beauty tech ecosystem, a series of connected devices harnessing big data augmented reality allowing to create meaningful, personalized and direct relationships with consumers. In its B2B business, the Holy Grail is Henkel’s digital twin along the digital thread. Henkel builds a digital twin along the entire value chain of the customer – starting with the initial customer request via deployment, until and after sales service – in order to sell outcomes to customers. In B2B the digital twin enables outcome- based servitization. Digital technologies are thus more than enabling technologies: digital technologies allow you to create fundamentally new, disruptive business models. The digital transformation needs small, agile teams with end- to- end responsibility for project delivery, start- up mentality and customer obsession. The fi nal aspect that this contribution discusses are metrics of the digital transformation such as digital effi ciency/ productivity, digital revenues and digital growth (net of cannibalization).