Opinion Piece: The invention of Wi-Fi (WLAN) and the Digital Transformation of Businesses
Did you know WLAN (commonly known as Wi-Fi) was invented at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) by a team of Australian scientists over 20 years ago?
Did you know that 6.4 billion devices are connected to the internet in 2016 and it’s expected to hit 24 Billion devices by 2020? That is almost 4 times more devices over the next 4 years!
Cast your mind back in time. Can you remember a time before flat screen smart TVs, smart phones and the WLAN/Wi-Fi? I can but it’s difficult to think how companies ran and grew before the 1990’s, without these.
Without the Australian invention of WLAN which predicated the Wi-Fi in the early 1990’s by a team working at CSIRO, the way companies are run and employees work and socialise today would have been very different. We all now live in a very mobile world; you can do anything online, anywhere.
I recently wrote about Digital Disruption and that investing in digital technology is critical to businesses to ensure they are keeping up with the modern day.
Looking back, the Digital Transformation and Disruption that brought Wi-Fi into businesses world have been huge. To stay ahead of the unfolding trends and disruptions, executives and board members across industries would have needed to challenge their assumptions and pressure-test their strategies.
Corporations aren’t the only entities changing the way they do things. For everyone, everyday life has changed. Take a look at smart phones – we are now contactable by phone, SMS, email and social media 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And this is only possible thanks to WLAN.
Keeping up with changing technology is a must for any business. In a disruptive world, businesses must be built to adapt, to embrace new technology and continuously learn new skillsets.
Looking back at the creation of 1-Stop Connections in 2002, 1-Stop’s objective was to ‘Continually improve the productivity in the Port Community so that all users benefit from efficiency gains.’ We began working in all the major terminals in Australia, then New Zealand. More recently we launched in Manila, in which the terminal experienced a 20% increase in truck servicing and a 30% decrease in dwell times in the first 2 weeks of operations. Terminals are seeing benefits in terms of efficiency, transparency and flow, and the ripple effect of these benefits is reaching the import and export community in the Philippines.
I believe that a well-connected Port Community will have access to more informative data and will be better able to make optimal decisions. Stakeholders who have access to information will be able to make fast, informed decisions and better ability to respond to your customers.
If the invention and improvement of Wi-Fi didn’t happen, 1-Stop Connections would not be where it is today as a company.
Australia helped bring WLAN to life and 1-Stop Connections is revolutionising the Global Freight and Logistics Community with solutions that you can use anywhere, anytime.
We support and encourage our 1-Stop team and the port community to be innovative, open and collaborative and that’s why as a technology company we are succeeding and results can be seen.
With each new solution our user community grows:
- more than 4,000 registered companies
- more than 10,000 individual web users
- more than 12,000 individual users of our flag ship product – the Vehicle Booking System (VBS)
- Over 7 million EDI messages are sent per month
- over 2,500 mobile app users
Here at 1-Stop we are an experienced and established start-up technology company that is continuing to grow every day and innovate the way our customers do business. We understand that all companies have different business needs, so to meet those needs we provide unique packages and tailor-made solutions. This way, we maximise the operating efficiency of the supply chain as a whole, making it better for the whole community.