The pandemic and the focus on the digitalization of national companies

According to Miguel Salgueiro, Founder Partner of NextBITT, Portuguese companies today see physical asset management as an important part of the value chain of their daily activity. Founded in 2015, the Portuguese software house achieved double-digit growth in 2020 and 2021, specializing in supporting the lifecycle management of organizations' assets and with projects with organizations such as Leroy Merlin, Via Outlets and MC, among others. For the future, he says, the focus remains on continuing to be at the forefront of technology associated with the management and optimization of organizations' physical assets and, especially, environmental management systems.

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FMCG - In 2021, NextBITT achieved a turnover of three million euros, which represents double-digit growth (60%), in contrast to the economy. How do you explain these results?

Miguel Salgueiro - These results can be explained by the consistency and solidification of the projects and services provided by NextBITT, as well as the assertiveness and relevance of our offer, together with our commitment to human capital and internal career progression, as fundamental pillars in the company's development.

This growth is also underpinned by the consolidation of NextBITT's integrated technology offering, based on five different areas - Asset Management, Facility Management, Field Service, Internet of Things & Sustainability - but which converge, allowing management indicators on a single dashboard, fed automatically, which help decision-making with data in real time and more quickly.

It is important to note that the fact that we have been developing more and more projects in large organizations (NextBITT has more than 25% of the PSI20 companies in its client portfolio, among others), which aim to guarantee complete traceability of physical assets throughout their useful life cycle, has been a very important and differentiating accelerator throughout our growth.

GC - Are Portuguese companies more ready to adopt technology for the management and optimization of physical assets?

MS - The pandemic has abruptly accelerated the focus on digitalization of national companies, forcing them to become more digital, otherwise they run the risk of being overtaken by their competitors.

Thus, from what we have seen of the market, this is an increasing concern for national companies and transversal in the digitalization of different industries, to the extent that Portuguese companies today already see the management of physical assets as an important 'part' of the value chain of their daily activity.

GC - Has the acceleration of digitalization during the pandemic brought any changes to the way companies manage their assets?

MS - Clearly, yes. This reality has brought a greater focus, for example, on building maintenance, with a special focus on preventive maintenance plans, rather than reactive ones. Here, it has clearly changed, thus increasing the useful life cycle of physical assets.

This situation, and the fact that management is done remotely, has also had an impact on more controlled stock management. In other words, with the adoption of NextBITT technology, companies now have an integrated view of asset management, thus achieving very significant operational gains.

We also feel that companies are increasingly hiring integrated services, rather than the traditional "man-hour".

GC - What is the added value for companies of having a physical asset management and optimization solution? What does NextBITT offer in this regard?

MS - By including a platform that manages and optimizes its physical assets, an organization can keep a permanent record of all its assets, as well as managing the useful life cycle of each physical asset. However, with the NextBITT platform, in addition to managing and optimizing physical assets, an organization can bring together the Environmental Management System module, which simplifies environmental compliance and sustainability reporting in a "top down" view, from departments to infrastructures to physical assets, in a single application.

This solution guarantees the management of the carbon footprint calculation, based on all the physical asset management information: energy quality metrics, water, gas, fossil fuels and tracking of hazardous waste produced, as well as the indoor environment of buildings. In addition, it also allows organizations to see consumption in real time, in a simple and low-cost way, which was previously not possible.

GC - Is sustainability an important component of NextBITT's offer?

MS - NextBITT is clearly committed to sustainability in order to become an international benchmark in five years' time. There is no doubt that our offer has become totally differentiating and disruptive, in terms of automating the process in relation to the Environmental Management System and Energy Management System components.

It's worth noting that our Asset Management offering, based on asset registration and building/industry sensing, now allows us to have a high level of expertise to feed the EMS and EMS fully automatically, based on ISO 14001 criteria. This commitment also stems from our experience in sustainability projects in the financial sector, now reinforced by the obligation imposed by the European community.

GC - Where does Portugal stand in terms of good corporate sustainability practices? Does it still have a long way to go?

MS - Sustainability, the new digital of organizations, has been creating a strong dynamic, an increasingly environmental culture, a whole new strategy in the different industries, based on ESG - Environmental, Social and Governance.

This new paradigm for companies, under the legislation published in the European Union, subject to the obligation to publish a "non-financial statement", with evidence of the data in the sustainability report, coming from the sensor connections to the NextBITT technology, provides greater awareness of good business practices oriented towards the rational, efficient and sustainable use of resources, where the implementation and maintenance of the EnvMS - Environmental Management System is crucial.

In this sense, I believe that Portugal has a strong chance of being at the forefront of Europe in terms of the best practices of organizations in terms of sustainability in the coming years. This is because there are already a huge number of public and private companies, associations and consultancies very focused on this issue, in which technology is the key element in sustainability management.

GC - Retail is one of the main sectors in which NextBITT develops physical asset management and optimization projects. How do you justify this commitment?

MS - Although we have a platform that is transversal to any area, retail is one of the sectors where NextBITT develops and has already developed projects with large organizations, focused on managing and optimizing their physical assets and reducing their carbon footprint. The strong focus on this sector is justified by the high carbon footprint these organizations emit and also by the large number of physical assets they have to manage throughout their day-to-day operations.

GC - What projects has NextBITT already developed with organizations in the retail sector?

MS - In the retail sector, NextBITT has already developed projects with several organizations, namely Leroy Merlin, Via Outlets, Sonae MC, Sonae Fashion, Worten, among others.

GC - What is your assessment of the partnership with Microsoft, based on Cloud Azure?

MS - The balance is extremely positive. Given that our market is mainly large national and multinational companies, all issues related to cybersecurity and guaranteed availability are deeply and repeatedly scrutinized by our clients' teams.

In this sense, our bet on Cloud Azure to make our platform available to the market simplifies and streamlines this whole process, since the guarantees provided by Microsoft allow us to focus on our Asset Management platform, while guaranteeing extremely high levels of Compliance and service to our customers.

GC - What expectations does NextBITT have until the end of 2022? What are the company's bets for this year?

MS - In 2022, NextBITT is focused on continuing to innovate its offer. The focus remains on the cutting edge of technology, associated with the management and optimization of organizations' physical assets and environmental management systems (EMS) and energy management systems (EMS), as this is a differentiating factor for our customers, partners and competitors. We want to continue offering a safe, effective and easy-to-use solution in an increasingly competitive market.

What's more, as NextBITT is always a global, unique and innovative company and a Microsoft partner, we plan to continue growing at a double-digit rate, with a strong focus on the environmental component.

Source: Grande Consumo