Video Case: GE Becomes a Digital Firm: The Emerging Industrial Internet Competing on Global Delivery with Akamai
INFORMATION SYSTEMS, ORGANIZATIONS, AND STRATEGY
GE Becomes a Digital Firm: The Emerging Industrial Internet Competing on Global Delivery with Akamai
1. What did Immelt mean by the “digitization of the industrial world” and “the industrial Internet?” What are the four central elements of the industrial Internet?
2. What were the three alternatives GE had for developing the hardware and software capabilities to become a digital firm?
3. Which option for developing its digital capabilities did GE choose and why?
4. Why did GE want to treat analytics as a company expertise just as it had always treated material science?
5. What example did Immelt use to illustrate the value of digital knowledge to GE customers?
6. What did Immelt mean when he said GE would become a “platform” and “app”
company?
7. Why did Immelt believe GE needed to hire thousands of new people to achieve its goals of becoming a digital firm?
8. What is the “culture of simplification” that Immelt believed was needed at GE?