People's Daily Online, Beijing, October 31 (Ouyang Yijia) China's economy continued to improve on the whole, powerfully boosting the confidence of foreign-funded enterprises in China's future development and their enthusiasm to invest in China. Recently, Angel Vina, CEO and founder of Denodo Technology Company, said when visiting People's Daily Online that China has a huge economy, attracting many large global companies to set up branches in China, and Chinese enterprises have the desire to "move from China to the world". All kinds of factors make opening up the Chinese market an "inevitable decision" of Denodo Company with the mission of globalization 。

Attached with transcript

host: Hello everyone, welcome to the "People's Reception Hall".

At present, further improving the confidence and enthusiasm of foreign enterprises in investment is crucial to promoting stable foreign investment and foreign trade and promoting high-quality economic and social development. In order to further reflect the development status of foreign-funded enterprises in China and show the opportunities provided by a more open Chinese market for the development of foreign-funded enterprises, this program invited Angel Vina, CEO and founder of Denodo Technology Company, to focus on topics such as the development status of foreign-funded enterprises in China and China's opportunities.

host: Angel Vina, welcome to people.com.cn.

Angel Vina： Thank you for your invitation. It's a pleasure to meet you and the audience. Thank you.

host: We know that Denodo is a company that chooses to develop in China. How do you view the Chinese market as the founder of this company? What are the reasons why Denodo chose to come to China for development?

Angel Vina : It is an inevitable decision for us to enter China, because we have quite a few customers operating in China, including many large global companies that have branches in China. We have more than 150 global customers and have a strong influence in the Chinese market. It is precisely because of the needs of these customers that we come here. Our products and services are very important for their global business development. The way we help customers manage data can ensure that they can operate their business better. This is one of the reasons.

China has a huge economy and is the second largest economy in the world. Many global companies have branches operating in the local market of China, but at the same time, many companies are expanding their business globally. We call this trend "a company moving from China to the world", which is also a kind of customer that we focus on cooperation and development. Our technology can help them grow and expand to global overseas markets. We have always been an international company with a global mission. I founded this company in a small city in northwest Spain, and then started the global pace. First, he founded a North American company, started his business in the American market, and then developed the European market in Britain, Germany, France and other countries. We came to Asia in 2015 and opened the first office in Asia in Singapore. At present, our global operation scope is also large, with more than 30 offices in 25 different countries, and team members from 41 different countries. We are such an international organization. China is an important region of our global layout, which has always been an important step in our company's development plan.

host: In recent years, China has introduced a series of policies to ensure the development of foreign-funded enterprises in China. What role do you think the introduction of these policies will play in the development of foreign-funded enterprises in China?

Angel Vina： These policies are very important to us. I think now is the best time. Because many changes are taking place in China's local market, including new foreign investment policies and regulations, as well as creating a stable and mutual trust business environment for foreign-funded enterprises in China, these policies are of great significance to us in many ways. The first is the foreign capital itself. How can the government help foreign-funded enterprises through newly issued laws and regulations related to foreign capital. We are eager to participate in the consultation and research of these laws and regulations led by the Beijing Municipal Government and the public consultation of foreign-funded enterprises.

In addition, it is important to generate these specifications based on the principle of mutual trust to implement business in China, which is the first step. Data is our main business area. Our software can help build better data systems, simplify access to distributed data assets, and ensure security. This is a scenario happening all over the world. Data is critical. Therefore, in these new regulations, data cross-border occupies a considerable space, including data exchange, data cross-border, data security, etc. Global companies, whether they are multinational companies operating in China or Chinese companies going overseas to expand the global market, all have the demand for information integration. They need complete data to support more informed decisions and enable the company to operate more efficiently, thus providing a better customer experience. It is important that these regulations stipulate the way of cross-border data transmission, in which our technology can play an important role to ensure the safety and compliance of data use.

In addition, talent flow is also the key point. I think that at present, Chinese government departments attach great importance to the introduction of foreign talents, and also attach great importance to the docking with China's rich local talent network, especially the cooperation with China's top research centers. Recently, I had the opportunity to visit some institutions, and I also arranged some institutional exchanges in my subsequent trip, such as the Blockchain Technology Research Center, the Institute of Cloud Computing and Big Data, the Department of Computer Science and Technology of Tsinghua University, and other national research centers or departments. China has many good talents. We already have a large number of Chinese employees in Chinese companies and other regions, but we hope to connect with these larger talent networks. We will support our global expansion by taking advantage of China's local resources, including these new laws, regulations, policies and technology centers. Its value is not only related to the local market, but also how to better support international companies and Chinese offshore companies, because we need a global talent network. For our company, intellectual property is the foundation. At present, there have been many changes to strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights, which has brought security to companies like us. Especially for knowledge intensive companies, its importance lies not only in policy formulation to protect foreign-funded enterprises, but also in government procurement, which is of great significance to us. Because the government is also an important user of our technology in other regions, our ability in this area is very strong. The Central Bank of Singapore is a very large customer of Denodo. This phenomenon is common in other regions, such as Britain, France and the United States in Europe. We also hope to introduce unique technologies and new dimensions to China. We hope to bring these values to your government through two kinds of data use experiences, whether through the automated mode of commercial applications or through direct manual interaction with the data ecosystem through the user interface. This undoubtedly needs to be based on trust, which needs to rely on norms and supervision. I will actively support local policies. I also see that Chinese government officials are trying to promote cooperation.  

host: As you said, today many technologies, such as big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, blockchain, are accelerating innovation and increasingly integrating into the whole process of economic and social development. In your opinion, what role does data management play in the development of the digital economy? What dividends can foreign enterprises enjoy when participating in the development of China's digital economy?

Angel Vina： You will be surprised to see how much business executives value data today. They are all top decision makers in the organization. Whether they are private enterprises, listed companies, or government agencies, the importance of data capitalization has been widely recognized. It goes without saying that only by making good use of data can business operations be done well, and government departments can better provide social services. No transaction can be separated from data, no decision can be separated from data, and no industrial system or automated process of manufacturing system can be separated from data. This means that data technology is the most important technology for today's CEO, and data management is the first priority. We can call it "digital transformation", that is, the transformation or journey to the digital economy. The digital economy needs to be built on a strong and unified data base, which is what we do. Our technology is used to help organizations unify multiple data assets into one business goal and create a unified data view. So that business users can use the data. Various emerging technologies, such as blockchain, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, etc., are based on data. For example, blockchain is mainly used for transaction traceability. Different data layers are stored in different nodes. The value of technology lies in that it can really build a different business application to support application scenarios in different industries and fields. AI is similar. No AI does not need data. Data is the core of the machine learning process, as well as in generative AI. In traditional AI technology, any application built with AI algorithm needs a bridge to connect data assets. Data exists behind everything, and process automation can only be achieved by using data well. Automation is also a hot topic today, especially in the manufacturing industry. From robots to the emergence of various advanced technologies, data management is crucial. Although data management sounds like an old topic, and it does not seem to be a new concept in the entire IT ecosystem, it is a very critical core capability, so as to create an agile and flexible data base, and all modern technologies can take place today.

host: Speaking of digital transformation, what difficulties do you think Chinese enterprises face in digital transformation? How can Denodo give full play to its own advantages to help Chinese enterprises to achieve digital transformation and development?

Angel Vina： I think there are three aspects. In fact, the challenges are much the same. The difficulties encountered by the IT ecosystem of Chinese enterprises are not much different from those in other regions, although the data maturity will be more or less different, which is a major topic today. That is to say, the cognition of data infrastructure and data ecosystem. It is not the most important to have data assets, but to understand how data can be used. Various organizations, government agencies, or private enterprises will extract a large amount of data, and the phenomenon of data explosion is very common today. The data volume will continue to grow at a double-digit growth rate in the next two to three years, even more than a dozen times. There is also the problem of data fragmentation, which is scattered in many different data repositories. Above that is the use of data. According to statistics, less than 4% of the data we collected were used. The data collected from various cameras, sensors and other devices has a global utilization rate of only about 4%, which is used to assist in better decision-making or better operations. Therefore, there is still huge space to promote the use of data. By mining the value of more data sets, more and better information can be obtained to support decision-making. In some areas, people call it the work of data democratization, but its ultimate goal is to make data easier to access and use by users. Business departments can more easily obtain the data they need, which is what we can help Chinese companies - help them significantly improve the use of data, which can be easily achieved with our unique technology. However, on the basis of Denodo's functions, I believe that the implementation of data culture by the government and senior managers of the company can really improve the use of data, acquire customers more quickly, better improve citizen life, improve the company's customer experience, and improve operational efficiency and employee productivity. All of these require visibility of data transactions and data usage in the data ecosystem.

Second, I think the most important value lies in safety and compliance. While increasing data usage, it is also necessary to control the use process. We manage data in a logical or virtualized way, which is to create a support layer on the underlying physical data storage and computing system to implement control, ensure data security, and implement data governance policies to truly help enterprises deliver data to the right users, or authorize the right users to use data. Because the process of controlling the use of data is very important, it can ensure the public visibility of data transactions. In an organization, there may be millions or billions of data transactions every year. Many data queries can be directly executed in seconds, but the key is to understand the use of data. It is also important for China to reflect on and understand the use of data through screening organizations, because China attaches great importance to data security. We need to use the right tools to ensure the security and compliance of data. It is very important to ensure that data is used correctly in a legal way.

I think the third key point is how foreign companies operating in China and Chinese enterprises going to sea can solve the problem of cross-border data management and sharing. Almost all countries in the world have strong legislative constraints on data privacy, data sovereignty, data asset control, etc., because data security and national security are inseparable. What we provide is a way to truly achieve data operability while ensuring that it complies with cross-border and transnational data regulations, which is particularly important for global companies. Naturally, these global companies are also our important target customers. They need to integrate data and do a good job in the safe use of cross global data. They need to exchange information for key functional departments, such as the human resources department. When they need to provide better customer service, not only in China, but also globally, data security and compliance are particularly important. Although we, as a small company, are still growing rapidly towards a brilliant future, our operations in various geographical regions of the world are quite mature. We hope to dedicate our global operation experience to Chinese local enterprises, companies and government agencies.

host: In your opinion, how can digitalization enable Chinese enterprises to better "go global" and share cooperation and development opportunities with the world?

Angel Vina： well. I think the message to Chinese entrepreneurs and government workers is obvious. I believe they already know very well that digitalization is the only way, and there is no future without digital transformation. McKinsey has done a very important research to compare the differences between leaders and laggards in business parameters. These key business indicators are very familiar to the CEO, because we need to report the company's revenue, profit, customer acquisition speed, net recommended value, employee productivity, operating efficiency, etc. to the Board of Directors frequently. However, the difference between leaders and laggards lies in the level of digital delivery. In fact, the term used by McKinsey in this report is data maturity, which can also be called digitalization or automation. The order of magnitude of the difference is not the percentage point level, but multiple, which is a huge gap. They mentioned the difference between two and three times. Companies in the same sector and vertical industry can gain competitive advantage through data maturity. I believe that the ecosystem of Chinese enterprises also knows this well. I met with many distinguished guests this week, including our agents in China, or the partners we are developing. I feel their sensitivity to digitalization and digital transformation. Enterprises in the Chinese market know very well that data maturity is a key indicator to "go global" and gain competitiveness in the world. In this process, we can contribute our expertise, which is our expertise accumulated over the years for serving the world's top and most complex companies. From Northern Europe to South Africa, from Latin America to Singapore, we have been working with extraordinary benchmark customers to help top international companies establish data maturity and data base, so that they can operate in a more competitive way today.

host: Okay, Angel Vina. Thank you very much for coming to the People's Daily Online. It's a pleasure to talk with you!

Angel Vina： Thank you for your invitation!

host: That's all for today's program. Thanks for watching. See you next time!

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