IT Strategy Consulting: Lufthansa Industry Solutions establishes new Business Area Digital Strategy

Lufthansa Industry Solutions is expanding its range of consulting services to include digital strategy consulting, combining technology expertise with industry knowledge. The IT service provider is thus meeting the growing demand for technology-based strategy consulting.

Norderstedt, July 14, 2022 - The pandemic has made the great need for German companies to catch up in digitalization particularly visible. For example, the latest figures from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) show that German industry invested 6.3 percent less in the first Corona year 2020 than in the previous year, while China and the US increased their investments significantly in the same period. In addition, many companies see the need to adapt or relaunch existing digitalization strategies, some of which are several years old, based on technological developments.

Dr. Lars Schwabe, Business Director Digital Strategy & IoT — Leads the new Business Area Digital Strategy: Dr. Lars Schwabe

Industry experience and technology expertise complemented by IT strategy consulting

The new "Digital Strategy" business area of Lufthansa Industry Solutions offers companies support in developing and implementing a future-oriented digital strategy. The Lufthansa subsidiary, which is regularly ranked among the best IT service providers in Germany in various rankings, has many years of experience in complex IT projects and broad implementation expertise. One success factor here is the combination of many years of industry experience with sound implementation expertise. In addition, the Technology Consulting unit, which advises on innovation topics and digitalization technologies and implements projects, has been established in recent years. The "Digital Strategy" unit within the business unit combines this expertise and expands it to include strategy consulting.

Pandemic uncovers high demand for strategy consulting

"We recognize a high demand for technology-based strategy consulting in the market," says Bernhard Kube, Vice President Technology Consulting, Research & Standards at Lufthansa Industry Solutions. Before the pandemic, he says, many digitalization initiatives had failed to deliver the economic value they had hoped for. "In the pandemic," Bernhard Kube continues, "it became additionally apparent that the digitalization of processes in companies still has a lot of catching up to do."

The new business area will be headed by Dr. Lars Schwabe. He was previously Vice President for Business Development at Merantix Labs GmbH in Berlin and before that had helped build up the Data Analytics and AI area at Lufthansa Industry Solutions. "Established strategy consultancies are often out of their depth when it comes to both complex IT topics and new digital technologies," says Schwabe. The expansion of the portfolio to include strategy consulting for digital and IT strategy is only logical and is meeting a very high demand, he adds.

Lufthansa Industry Solutions is a service provider for IT consulting and system integration. This Lufthansa subsidiary helps its clients with the digital transformation of their companies. Its customer base includes companies both within and outside the Lufthansa Group, as well as more than 300 companies in various lines of business. The company is based in Norderstedt and employs more than 2,100 members of staff at several branch offices in Germany, Albania, Switzerland and the USA.