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The following excerpt of an interview with Erin Van Remortel, Customer Experience (CX) Strategist at Verizon Enterprise Solutions, was conducted by Ryan Gaviria, Senior Analyst and Conference Director at the Customer Management Practice, who granted permission to repost much of the content of the original article.

From finance to sales to operations, artificial intelligence (AI) and other self-learning automation are impacting every part of your business. But what about customer experience (CX)?

When it comes to improving customer experience, we’re in the midst of a true revolution. Nearly 80 percent of companies selling to consumers report that they are already using or plan to use an AI-powered virtual agent for customer service by 2020.

By now the benefits of unified communications (UC) platforms are well known, and many businesses are rushing to make the move. UC can help your organization to better control costs, streamline your operations, improve employee productivity and deliver better customer experiences.

The number of organizations implementing software-defined networking (SDN) technologies is set to increase dramatically, according to our latest research. We believe there are good reasons for that, particularly in a world where digital transformation requires organizations to be ever-more agile and fleet-of-foot.

Cybersecurity is a critically important C-suite issue for the companies we meet. From the threat of a devastating attack to the possibility of a damaging customer privacy breach, the vast majority of boards we talk to now recognize the potentially existential danger of poor cybersecurity and resilience.

As more people are moving to cities, traffic-related fatalities have risen. The National Safety Council estimates 40,100 traffic deaths occurred in the U.S. in 2017, with Rhode Island posting an 87% increase in traffic deaths from 2015-2017 and Kansas increasing 29% in that same timeframe.

In this age of digital transformation and accelerated change, every business is under mounting pressure to embrace reinvention and focus on innovation. But what does that mean in practice?

The popularity of cloud-based services is growing rapidly. It’s predicted that by 2020, 92% of workloads will be processed by cloud data centers[i]. As more enterprises make the shift to managed network and cloud services, they’re using them to transform the way they do business.

Many of our larger clients face a daunting dilemma. On the one hand, they have never been under more pressure to be nimble as they face rapid transformation and disruption in their key markets.

There are a few companies that I trust with my identity information and personal data implicitly, even as a lifelong security guy.  They simply give me so much value that I stay authenticated to their services at work, at home, in the car, and on mobile.  On the other hand, there are many companies that I completely avoid because of the annoying and creepy methods they use to showcase how they are tracking me, my location and my behavior.  After all, there is a fine line between digital stalking and consumer trust.

Our 16 new cybercrime case studies provide insight into the biggest threats you face—plus tips on how to prevent them.

Read about one of the 2017 Data Breach Digest characters, Panda Monium. This scenario looks at what happened when one university was attacked by an Internet of Things (IoT) botnet barrage of 5,000 hosts.

Can you handle the volume, variety and velocity of IoT data?

Scenario #15 of the cybercrime case studies detailed how employees at one small company had access to their files held to ransom. Discover how you can avoid finding yourself in a Catch 22 situation.

Data Breach Digest scenario #8 focused on a critical infrastructure breach by a hacktivist. But it’s not just high-profile organizations that are at risk. Get our top tips for mitigating and responding to hacktivist attacks.

One of the cybercrime case studies in the Data Breach Digest involved pirates hacking into a global shipping company’s content management system to access data that aided their plunder. Learn how to protect yourself.