How the Pandemic is Transforming the Tech Space
The unprecedented global pandemic came without an official announcement but left the world with shock in its wake. Life changed, global work culture got a shift, and several impossible figures were seen in parallel industries. Entrepreneurs had to make life-changing decisions, many were forced to retrench their staff and so much more were forced to catch up with the changing tides of doing business. How in particular did this affect the technology landscape and the way we consume it?
Zoomed Up
With the world locked indoors, most businesses adopted the work from home culture and changed to total or partial remote work operations. One important tool that made life easy was the Zoom video call software. Video meetings and webinars became the new normal, and this was not hard for businesses to adopt because it was the only feasible way to survive.This seismic shift may become the new way of doing business.
Amazed by Amazon
Amazon is the world’s leading internet retail and tech Lord; and its share size and business model was more than prepared for global eventualities like this. In the middle of the pandemic, it was reported that while mortar and brick retailers had to shut down due to the government-imposed lockdown, Amazon had a surge in demand for its retail services and could boast of employing about 175,000 more employees.
Apart from this, Amazon also had a surge in its AWS (Amazon Web Services) revenues; it rose by 29%. This was because many offices had to be operated using cloud technology, and Amazon was born ready to handle the cloud of the pandemic.
Rise in Stock Prices
As Zoom soon became a household name, this translated to an increase in its stock prices, its stocks reached an all-time high on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange. Just before the pandemic it sold at less than a hundred dollars per share but is currently close to five hundred dollars, a feat achievable thanks to the pandemic. Amazon saw a 60% surge in its stock price and an income double of what it made in the previous year. Google’s parent company Alphabet had a 43% increase year on year.
In Other News
Families and children were at home and there was an increasing need to fight boredom, the entertainment technology sector recorded a mass harvest, Netflix saw an increase in subscriptions and revenue. The pandemic also recorded the founding of new startups. Prime examples were two African built video conferencing apps launched during the pandemic with reasons varying from distant servers and cybersecurity issues experienced on existing platforms. Also, Africa saw the edTech platform uLesson partner pay TV giant Multichoice to air its lessons on its DSTv and GoTv platforms in order to drive quality learning while students were at home.
It looks clear that we may not return to the world as we knew it before the pandemic. We are in a new normal and technology today will play a major role going forward. The year 2020 A.D. will be forever remembered as the year that made technology a normal for the world and making technology businesses rich and famous.
