Piotr Jelenski, CEO of Asseco South Eastern Europe: We are Looking at Great Challenges in Adoption of Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is slowly penetrating everyday business processes. Its implementation is still not at the level that can enable the full usage of the potentials, but an increasing number of users sees that the future belongs to the technology and knowledge of a useful utilization of an enormous number of data which are created daily.

Piotr Jelenski, the CEO of ASEE (Asseco SEE), says in his interview for eKapija on the occasion of his visit to Belgrade for the Data Science Conference Europe 2021 that, at this moment, in the IT market, there’s a great amount of money circulating, which is good for the development of entrepreneurship. However, on the other hand, there are problems with the implementation of the technology of data processing, security and the training of staff, which will all be great challenges on the road to the full implementation of artificial intelligence in everyday business and life.

It seems that the market of IT technologies has accelerated in the past months. We are witnesses to numerous acquisitions, among others, ASEE has acquired the company Things Solver. Is a strategic positioning for a future time being done at the moment?

– I don’t think it has to do with a future time. It is happening on a daily basis – it is part of the economy and business. New companies are emerging, they have their initiatives. Some of them have business maturity, others don’t. Talking about the current moment, there’s a lot of money in the market, lots of startups, sponsors, funds toward which a large amount of money is being directed. Of course, statistically, a large number of those companies fail. There’s certainly a great flow of capital toward entrepreneurship at the moment, more than usual, but, sooner or later, I expect the amount of that money to be reduced.

Talking about business, it is often forgotten that economic activities take place in a determined, regulated environment. ASEE already offers solutions for state institutions, and, according to you, what are the fields that state organs need to pay attention to in order to secure an efficient administrative environment?

– I believe that the governmental and official institutions have a great opportunity to accelerate the processes they carry out. Certainly, the digitalization of processes is one of the priorities, document management, digitalization of all business processes creates, for both the administration and the users, an efficient environment in which it is easier to do business.

An important element of this process is education, because we see that there’s not enough implementation and tool upgrade. You need to have proper processes of technology adaptation. To define the users, to train the users how to use the technologies efficiently. That is why you constantly need to upgrade the elements of training, which need to develop along with the tools.

When we’re talking about online financial transactions, we cannot avoid mentioning the problem of security. How challenging is this field in the modern world?

– I believe that this is a great challenge. Users don’t want to be disturbed or have security complicate their lives – memorizing numerous passwords, entering various authentications, takes up a lot of time and causes stress. And if we take shortcuts, we are not safe. That is why we need to find a balance between security and tool usage and that will be a great challenge for the future. Also, identity theft will be a great challenge. Our data, including face recognition and fingerprints, can be stolen. Their protection will also be a great challenge in the future.

In your opinion, does the security aspect need to follow the development of new technologies in parallel? Are there discrepancies in this field between the desired possibilities and the reality?

– I believe that there are no discrepancies. The institutions and apps themselves, by which I mean, for example, financial institutions, are being excessive with security. For example, some institutions require a triple authentication when you’re making money transactions, which can be very painful. That’s how I would define discrepancy. The question which is important is how to facilitate the carrying out of transactions, the speed, and I believe that, in that respect, we are on the right path, but we are still looking at numerous challenges.

Finally, from the perspective of ASEE, how does the future on doing business in an online environment look and where do you want to position yourself?

– We are trying to shape our business, we are trying to shape online sales, we are especially focusing on e-trade and business, on both the organic development and acquisitions. We see that there’s a potential for the growth of our business and that it is the priority in the upcoming period.

In Serbia – good managers

Several acquisitions which have taken place in our market recently show that Serbia has good IT experts. Considering that Piotr Jelenski does not come from the IT world, but that he is a manager who runs an IT company, he says for eKapija that he sees a lot of human capital qualified to do management jobs in Serbia.

– Due to the history, the background, the legacy, Serbia is a good example for quality managers. What I can say at the moment, in a simplified way, in a few words, is that the openness to new initiatives, the courage and the will to take risks are a strength. Probably, the weakness is an expression of self-reflection and self-criticism and the will to advance by small steps in order to avoid mistakes, instead of rushing ahead. I believe that such mistakes exist everywhere and I can conclude that Serbia has very good potentials – Piotr Jelenski concludes in his interview for eKapija.

Nikola Ignjatovic

ASEE Solutions doo Beograd

Things Solver doo Beograd

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