Your Story SMB Week: BFSI experts explain why SMBs must adopt cloud technology amidst coronavirus lockdown

During YourStory’s SMB week, powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS), industry leaders from the BFSI sector came together on a WhatsApp chat to discuss how SMBs can start adopting cloud services during these uncertain times to ensure business continuity.

The nationwide lockdown due to the novel coronavirus pandemic is a make-or-break period for Indian Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs). Enterprises that adapt to these changing times will grow; others will get left behind, or worse, be forced to shut shop.

SMBs across the country are wondering how to ensure business continuity with manufacturing units shut, exports blocked, and supply of goods to the market restricted. Further, their regular channels of credit that keep their operations afloat, have dried up as creditors are refusing to lend until there is better news.

To help enterprises power through these difficult circumstances, YourStory started “SMB week – Converse, Combat, Conquer”, a special, first-of-its kind WhatsApp chat series, powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS). The chat series, which started on April 13, 2020, will go on till April 18, 2020.

In this series, leaders from various sectors such as the banking and financial services industry (BFSI), e-commerce, retail, and more, are expected to provide guidance on reworking sales forecasts, managing revenue, cash flow slumps and supply chain disruptions, among other topics, to help SMBs weather the storm.

In the first session of the WhatsApp chat series, held on 13 April, industry leaders from the BFSI sector came together to discuss how SMBs can start adopting cloud services during these uncertain times to ensure business continuity.

There was consensus that SMBs need to leverage conference calls, online meetings, video conferencing, and webinars to interact with employees on a daily basis. The experts also agreed SMBs should use the available time and technology to frequently interact with clients, vendors, investors and other stakeholders to give them confidence that their business will survive.

Ketan Gaikwad, CEO and MD, Receivables Exchange of India (RXIL) said, “Just imagine the situation if such a pandemic hit the world 10 years ago. Back then, before the proliferation of cloud technology, it was a world heavily dependent on physical servers, networks and their individual up-times and availability. The sheer scale of human resources needed to run a datacentre would have resulted in partial to total platform outages for SMBs during such a pandemic”.

The advantages of cloud

Due to its inherent cost, manageability and scale advantages, cloud technology is being looked at as an innovative way SMBs can ensure business continuity during uncertain times. Post the pandemic, cloud-based technology, characterized by the ability to host platforms or services from remote locations easily accessible via the Internet, could become the new normal for SMBs.

Ketan added adopting cloud technology “must truly be the first choice, and there must be a compelling reason for a business not to do so.”

With SMBs looking to rationalize costs and conserve cash flow, cloud technology and solutions are emerging as efficient ways to keep businesses running and mitigate the extent of the financial damage caused by the pandemic.